Catalyst
by looneyluna
Summary: The universe is filled with what ifs. Daniels is wrong -- Jonathan Archer isn't the only catalyst of the future. The second Xindi attack isn't averted and Hoshi is lost. Can history be repaired and Hoshi be stopped from decrypting the Aquatics' code?
1. Default Chapter

Title: The Catalyst

Author: Looneyluna

Rating: R

Category: Suspense/Romance

Code:

Summary: The universe is filled with what ifs. Daniels is wrong -- Jonathan Archer isn't the only catalyst of the future. The second Xindi attack isn't averted and Hoshi is lost. Can history be repaired and Hoshi be stopped from decrypting the Aquatics' code? One will try to stop her – stop her in the beginning.

Author's Notes – Thanks to Kathy Rose and PJ for beta reading, and Chris for plot holes. No copyright infringement is intended. I own nothing. I'm just playing around. This story starts in an alternate season three ending, and explores all seasons.

--

PROLOGUE --

He stared at the battered hull plating and sighed, knowing he would never return to his security duties at the colony. It had been nearly five years since the end of the Xindi war – the end of the final battle. Both sides had lost.

The Xindi had obliterated Earth with one massive blast from the weapon, effectively destroying the Lunar colonies as well. The Reptilians had had little time to regroup, and the allied forces of the Earth and Xindi alliance had successfully destroyed the weapon.

A name had brought Malcolm Reed back to Enterprise – Hoshi Sato.

Commodore Archer's message had been brief.

"I need you for a mission. It involves Hoshi…"

There was more to the message, but he had paid little attention.

Malcolm was home.

Watching the warning lights on the airlock, he shifted uneasily. Enterprise was battered and worn, and hardly any of the original crew was left.

Trip was still keeping his "true love" together, and Archer would never leave her. Travis was captain of his own freighter, and T'Pol had returned to Vulcan.

Hoshi – she had been presumed dead when the weapon had been destroyed.

She had been taken when he was away on that godforsaken mission to the sphere. His guilt still continued to wake him up at night. He had lost Corporal Hawkins on that mission, and he had been unable to prevent Hoshi's abduction.

The light switched to green and the airlock hatch slid open.

An older, haggard looking Jonathan Archer greeted him. "Hello, Malcolm."

"Sir." Malcolm nodded.

"How was your trip?"

Making a noncommittal reply, Malcolm followed the Commodore down the hall and into his ready room.

Saying nothing, Jon walked behind his desk and reached into a drawer, pulling out and placing two devices on the desk. With a resigned sigh, he finally spoke. "I swore I would never do this, but I've got to try to prevent what they are planning."

Always a man of few words, Malcolm listened.

"Daniels has found some favorable threads – ones where the Federation contains Earth as a founding member. Naturally, the event that must be altered is the second attack."

"How many catalysts?" Malcolm asked, wondering how many lives would be affected.

"Just one."

He could tell by the inflection in Archer's voice who it was. "Sir, I can't –"

"They're going to send somebody back to kill her, Malcolm – before Klang."


	2. Chapter One

Chapter One --

Stepping into the past was disorienting, and Malcolm chose not to study the dynamics too closely lest he become mired in the complexities of time travel and forget why he was here.

Hoshi. He had to stop her. Humanity would not survive another junctural incursion. The first Xindi attack had wiped out seven million people. When multiplied exponentially in terms of potential and parentage, the effects of the grandfather paradox were devastating.

It was unnerving, whole families disappearing with only a cold record and the vague memories of their loved ones insisting they were gone. It had been too late to avoid the paradox that trickled through the temporal threads like a plague. That trickle had turned into a flood, and by the time Daniels and his temporal faction had realized the damage their complacency had caused, it had been beyond measure.

It took a few years for history to rewrite itself. That's why the effects of the first Xindi attack weren't felt for well over several linear years. It was doubtful the future…his future…could survive another temporal event. The destruction of the entire planet would devastate all existing threads and wipe humanity clean from the universal history books.

Their resources were thin and accuracy was "a thing of the past." The temporal cold war had become hot and Daniels' faction had finally seen fit to take an active roll in changing the events and guiding the catalysts of said events now that the damage to Federation history was irreparable.

Daniels had done more harm than good, keeping things hidden and telling only half-truths. Why the Captain had chosen to believe the temporal agent this time was beyond Malcolm's comprehension, but even T'Pol could see the logic behind the argument, even if she did protest to sending Malcolm back in time.

Malcolm hadn't been there for the initial meeting, but he had gone over the mission details with a calculated precision – not that there was much detail to the mission. When working with temporal mechanics, there was no strategy.

Although the Captain is and will be the medium who will determine Earth's entrance into the Federation, Hoshi Sato was the catalyst whose linguistic ability destroyed the Earth and the Lunar colonies.

At first, Daniels had opted for a surgical assassination of Enterprise's communications officer – an attempt that would take place in the past, but the Captain had refused the plan, telling Daniels to get the hell out of his office and never return.

Daniels had countered with a compromise – stop Hoshi Sato from accepting Jonathan Archer's offer of a posting to Enterprise, therefore negating her role in the current temporal thread.

Even though Captain Archer had taken a strong disliking to mucking around in the timeline, he had agreed, but with one condition.

He would choose the person to travel back into Hoshi's past. Someone Archer trusted.

Malcolm had smiled as he had witnessed Daniels squirm. The Captain had the temporal agent by the balls as long as there was a snowball's chance in hell Earth would still be a founding member of the Federation. Archer had chosen Malcolm for the mission.

The sound of laughter brought him back to his current reality, and he ducked behind a recycling bin as the hushed voices of a drunken couple came to him. Palming the UT and the PADD, Malcolm righted himself and started walking down the alley in Macapa, Brazil.

He needed to find Hoshi.

"You two are the most ungrateful, horny grad students on the planet. Professor Sato is getting ready to blow out the candles and you two bail on us!" a voice shouted down the alley as the lovers ambled toward Malcolm.

Apparently accuracy hadn't become a thing of the past. Daniels' team had placed him spot on – right geographic location and the right time. Her birthday. He had a little over a month to convince her to resign from Starfleet and make sure Archer didn't approach her. There was no going back now.

The drunken lovers passed him, oblivious to the party and him.

Malcolm made his way to the bar. The bartender was tending to a large drink order and he went unnoticed.

He heard her before he saw her, Hoshi's laughter having always been infectious. Looking into the mirrored wall behind the bar, Malcolm scanned the room.

As he watched her serve cake to her friends, he smiled. She was in her element, teasing her students in an alien language and using the event to further their studies. She spoke in various languages to them, making them guess as to the hodgepodge of dialects she was using and what she was saying.

A young man with dark skin and a thick accent groused, "I'm off duty, Professor. We brought you here to relax and enjoy yourself. Why don't you give the Pig Latin a rest?"

Clutching her chest in mock horror, the guest of honor gasped, "But language is my life. It's my passion. I get giddy over the texture and rhymes of Orion poetry and the melodious monotony of Vulcan meditative chants. Try saying that three times fast."

Some of the people at the table chortled.

"Most of all…I love the sound of your staccato pronunciation of Latin, Pun Jab." Hoshi raised her glass in mock salutation. "Thank God, the language is truly dead."

The entire table broke out in laughter and Malcolm couldn't help but laugh.

"What'll you have?" the bartender asked, breaking Malcolm's concentration.

Looking down at the UT, Malcolm could hardly believe the man had spoken Portuguese to him. Daniels' technology was much faster than Enterprise's. "I'll have a beer," he replied, unaware Hoshi had walked up behind him.

"We'll have another round, Paulo," she stated in flawless Portuguese.

Watching from across the room was surreal, but feeling her curious stare was unnerving.

She was alive and this wasn't a dream. In his reality, she was dead. Even among the wreckage of the Xindi weapon, they hadn't found any traces of her DNA.

"Where are you from?" she questioned knowingly.

He looked down and tried to ignore her.

Pulling up the stool next to him, Hoshi sat down and glanced at him in the mirror. "So, where are you from?" she repeated, thinking he may not have heard her.

Her eyes caught his, yet he still made no reply. He couldn't. His throat was dry and the beer Paulo set down in front of him wasn't going to help. How was he going to approach her?

She nudged him, smiling. "I heard you order and noticed your accent."

Malcolm nodded.

"I'm a linguist, by the way," she explained, not in the least perturbed by the stranger's lack of response.

"So where am I from?" he asked softly, taking a sip of his beer.

"Originally…" she started, but paused, drumming her fingers on the table. "Leicestershire, but your family migrated…possibly Southeast Asia. I'm quite fond of British accents."

Malcolm blinked, not believing what he was hearing. She was flirting with him!

"I'm Hoshi…" her voiced softened, hoping the man would volunteer some information.

He nodded his reply, starting to gulp his beer. This was just great. Just who the hell was he supposed to be? He couldn't be Malcolm Reed, newly appointed armory officer onboard Earth's first warp five flagship. At least he wouldn't run into himself here. Always the workaholic, he was already onboard Enterprise, sleeping and eating in the armory.

He had no cover – no in as to how to meet her. He was being handed a golden opportunity and he was blowing it. She started to get up, obviously discouraged.

"You were right. I was born in Leicestershire."

Sitting back down, Hoshi turned and didn't say anything, quirking her eyebrow.

Malcolm laughed. She hadn't even met T'Pol yet, and Hoshi had gotten the Vulcan's eyebrow movement down pat.

"What's so funny?" she asked.

Tapping the bar and motioning for another beer, Malcolm shrugged. "You reminded me of someone just now."

Hoshi leaned closer to him. "Oh, really? A good someone or a bad someone?"

"Good," he replied with a smirk.

"Are we going to have to play twenty questions so I can get to know you better?"

She was aggressive. Normally he found aggressive women off-putting, but an aggressive Hoshi was refreshing. "You're already down by five questions," he retorted. "I'm only down by one."

"Well, then. I guess I'd better make them good ones."

Malcolm smiled, not willing to give anything away. He definitely had the advantage.

"Let's start with a name," she prodded, hoping to get the information out of him without asking a question.

Malcolm laughed. "You'll have to ask me."

Hoshi chewed her lip in contemplation, a characteristic he knew all too well. "I hate wasting a question on this, but I don't want to continue this conversation by calling you 'Bub' or 'Hey You.'" Sighing heavily, she asked, "What's your name?"

"M— Actually it's my turn to ask a question. In fact, I've got four more questions before we're even."

"Here you go, Hoshi," Paulo interrupted, pushing a tray full of drinks in her direction.

Hoshi scooted off the stool, bumping into Malcolm and grabbing the tray. "I'll be right back, okay?"

"You just wasted another question," he stated with a smirk.

Rolling her eyes heavenward, she took her friends their drinks and made an excuse to return to the bar. She returned to Malcolm's side amidst hoots and whistles. "Ask away."

"Where are you from?" he asked, already knowing the answer.

"Earth," she retorted. "Next question."

"That's a pretty vague answer."

"You need to be more specific, then."

"That was a boring question anyway."

"Do you always approach strange men in bars?

"That depends. Are you strange?"

"I can be if the need arises. That was question number seven, by the way."

"How often does the need arise?" she baited him.

He felt a blush crawl up his neck and reach his ears.

"And he blushes," she called out triumphantly.

"Eight," he muttered.

"That was a statement, not a question."

Feeling the need to steer the conversation onto safer ground, Malcolm asked, "Are you a teacher?" As soon as the words passed his lips, he could see her demeanor change.

"That's a rather closed-ended question," she observed. "Yes."

"How many languages do you know?"

Hoshi feigned a yawn. "Thirty-eight. Boring. Two more to go before I get to go."

"How old are you today?"

Hoshi smiled, pleased he had paid enough attention to know it was her birthday. "Twenty-five."

"What's your favorite language?"

She cringed. "Please don't make me pick one. I love them all. Do you know any languages other than English?" she countered.

Clearing his throat, Malcolm confessed, "I know enough French and Spanish to get into trouble."

"I'm sure you know more than that," Hoshi stated in French, which was quickly translated by the UT in his pocket.

"If I do, you'll be the last to know," he teased.

"Hey, Professor! You coming?" a tall red-haired woman called out.

Hoshi pushed her glass away and hopped off the stool.

"Malcolm," he blurted out.

She grinned and held out her hand. "It was a pleasure meeting you, Malcolm. I look forward to finishing our game some day."

Her birthday celebration had ended and her friends were leaving.

"Maybe someday," Malcolm said in French, under his breath.


	3. Chapter Two

The hues of red and orange broke over the horizon, but went unnoticed by the man on the verandah. The treetops still held the morning dew and branches rattled as various animals stirred from their slumber. Malcolm had gotten little sleep. What sleep he had managed to get was riddled with the snapshots of past events of his life overlaid with visions of his knotted rope.

The knotted rope, the shrink had said, was a representation of the way Malcolm viewed the overwhelming and incomprehensible temporal lines.

Lines don't really exist in time-travel theory. They are humanity's attempt to categorize the present, past, and future.

In his dream he was a little boy – his father taunting him. The man's caustic tone showed the five-year-old his disappointment and disdain.

__

"Now is as good as time as any to learn how to swim," his father called out, grabbing the young boy by his shirt collar and throwing him overboard.

The water had been freezing and he had struggled for the surface, listening to his father yell, "_Just grab the rope, boy!"_

The rope was in front of him, frayed and flowing, like a white beacon in the murky water. It was beyond his reach and it was as though it were alive and waving at him. He could see the small fibers of twine separate and merge with the fluidic braid. Loops and holes merged with the water…

Malcolm never got past that part of his dream. His father had finally realized his son was in danger of drowning and pulled him out of the water, cursing the child's inadequacies.

To Malcolm, the rope was time and the frayed parts were alternate timelines. He was here to find a favorable alternative to the present reality – the one where Hoshi was dead.

The clearing of a throat ended Malcolm's reverie.

"My apologies, sir," a nervous voice stated. "Had I known you were awake –"

"Don't worry about it, Miguel." Malcolm stifled a yawn. "I guess I'm still adjusting to the time zone."

The groundskeeper shifted uneasily. "Is there anything I can get you?"

Looking at him as if he was an unknown alien, Malcolm shook his head. He'd never had anybody wait on him before. It was unnerving – just like the grounds and the mansion. To the neighborhood, the mansion was home to an absentee owner, rarely occupied but beautifully kept. It was a base – a base Daniels' faction had arranged for their missions. So much for being inconspicuous, but at least he didn't have to sleep in the park.

"No thank you, Miguel."

Malcolm watched the other man withdraw before he read the news report displayed on the PADD –March 3, 2151. He had a little over a week to convince Hoshi to leave Starfleet and plant the UT where it would do the most good.

Looking over his shoulder to make sure Miguel was out of earshot, Malcolm started running calculations. "What are the temporal probabilities of the following variables?" he murmured to the PADD.

The PADD chirped in response, "Please enter the variables."

"The Universal Translator…placing it where it can be found by Starfleet. Non-interference with catalyst, Hoshi Sato."

"Target event?"

"Destruction of Earth by Xindi weapon."

Setting the PADD down to wait for the results, he picked up the UT. It was designed specifically for Enterprise and contained several thousand languages even Hoshi hadn't heard. It could easily take her place and Hoshi would be able to continue teaching, never realizing the destruction her talent would reap.

"Search parameters complete," the computer announced. "There are seven thousand eight hundred thirty-three permutations. Assuming you are trying to prevent the destruction of Earth, one hundred twenty-three solutions are favorable. That would lead to a one point five percent –"

"End stat search," Malcolm barked, feeling defeated. The odds weren't in his favor and he'd be a fool to gamble on them. Just leaving the updated UT to be found would be a catastrophic mission. _But Hoshi's thread would remain intact and intertwining with his_, he reasoned silently.

The ability to change the course of known events was staggering – an almost god-like power. He knew what he had to do, but the selfish side of him just wanted to ensure Hoshi's happiness.

Tapping the PADD, Malcolm brought up the network of threads that represented the events that so tenuously form someone's life – this one was Hoshi's. He entered more instructions and pulled up another fibrous network -- his. The overlay of his contributions and actions on top of hers was vastly different – the only part of it touching representing the time they had served together on Enterprise. Theirs was a mere intersection of time, representing only three short years of linear experiences. He longed for the fibers to intertwine and stretch, but that had not happened.

He loved her. He didn't realize it until it was too late. If he had acted on the attraction he had felt… Maybe things would have turned out differently.

Malcolm had argued with Archer, telling him to choose someone else for the mission. He had had nothing to hide and had readily admitted how he had always felt about Hoshi. He was too personally involved to be objective. Add his lack of objectivity to the potential to damage his own thread, Malcolm had almost convinced the Commodore he had made the wrong decision. If it hadn't been for the threat on her life, Malcolm never would have taken this assignment.

His plan of not interfering in Hoshi's life was blown to hell the moment he stepped into the bar last night. If he was reading the threads correctly, a new line was forming. New alternates formed all the time. It really wasn't anything to get excited about. It was probably a mistake that it coincided with their chance meeting last night.

The temporal PADD chirped again, breaking Malcolm's concentration. "Unauthorized temporal displacement detected."

"Location?" Malcolm asked the machine.

"Macapa, Brazil."

That bloody bastard better run the next time Malcolm caught up to him. Archer was right not to trust the weasel, Daniels. He tapped on the newly formed thread – Hoshi's new alternate. "List all events associated with the following thread."

The PADD chirped a moment later, "Professor Hoshi Sato, exo-linguist at Amazon University in Macapa, Brazil. Personal residence located at 0401 Rua Do Angel. Date of Death March 3, 2151 due to unknown circumstances."

Malcolm grabbed his equipment and ran through the tropical garden past Miguel, not responding when the groundskeeper called after him.

--

Stepping out of the shower, Hoshi began to towel herself dry. Even with the day off and no matter how hard she tried, she just couldn't sleep late. Wiping the fog off the mirror, she combed her hair and smiled.

Last night hadn't been a total loss. She had actually had a good time. Some of the celebration was a bit fuzzy, but she did remember a pair of ice-blue eyes and a British accent. It really was too bad she hadn't had the time to give him her number…not that she was in the habit of picking up strange men.

She pulled on her clothes – a baggy jogging suit. Today was a lazy, stay-at-home, disconnect all com devices, and veg-out day. Hoshi straightened, a sudden shift of subtle pitches alarming her. "Juana?"

Puzzled by the lack of an answer, Hoshi went to greet her roommate who wasn't due back for another three weeks. "Did the dig end early?"

She rounded a corner and frowned. No one was there.

An arm clamped around her waist and a hand over her mouth, pulling her off balance and into a warm wall of muscle. She managed a muffled scream before her assailant pulled her into the den and kicked the door shut.

"If you want to live, don't make any noise," a male voice whispered harshly into her ear.

Fear coursed through her and reason ceased, so she struggled against him.

"They are down the hall and they've come to kill you," Malcolm bit out sharply. "Please calm down and quit struggling."

Reason slowly asserted itself and she recognized his voice. The man from the bar…he had followed her!

He shifted the hand over her mouth, giving her the opportunity she needed. She Bit down on his thumb as hard as she could.

He released her instantly, shoving her roughly to the floor and pulling some sort of weapon out. "Don't move!"

"What do you want?" she asked softly, looking at the weapon.

"To save you," he answered swiftly, nursing his hand, looking out the door, and keeping an eye on her.

Hoshi looked around the room frantically and she cursed today's plan. She had already unplugged the com units.

Through the crack in the door, Malcolm saw a shadow near the entry door. The crack under the door turned black and a gelatinous form started to emerge – a Suliban!

"I'm sorry about this," he whispered as she tried to get away from him.

She had no time to scream as a flash of light struck her in the stomach.

Gathering her in his arms, he pressed a panel on his PADD. "Computer, temporal shift for one hour from now, execute on my mark."

The PADD beeped in compliance.

"Mark."

The door swung open and Malcolm watched the shocked face of the Suliban soldier fade from his view. He just hoped he had bought them enough time.


	4. Chapter Three

Chapter Three –

Unfamiliar sounds woke her and she opened her eyes, panicked. A sharp intake of breath told her she wasn't alone, and Hoshi closed her eyes and pretended she was still unconscious.

Peeking at the man who was bandaging his hand and mumbling to himself, she thought to herself, "Good! I hope it gets infected." She stiffened when he stood up and walked toward her.

"You might have a slight headache, not to mention some tenderness around your abdomen, but you left me little choice," the man informed her.

His clipped accent brought back flashes of last night's conversation, and she remembered his name – Malcolm. He obviously didn't believe her act, and she sat up slowly. "What do you want?"

Malcolm smiled. "We don't have much time before they realize what I've done. We need to leave."

Looking at him with disdain, Hoshi scoffed, "Are you crazy? I'm not going anywhere with you." She started to stand, but stopped as soon as she saw his gun.

"I'm not going to hurt you," Malcolm assured. "You've got to trust me." His eyes followed hers, and he saw her looking at his phase pistol.

"Look…Malcolm," she stated caustically. "Just do whatever you came to do and get it over with."

Malcolm suppressed another smile. She had been through Starfleet basic training and had obviously taken basic self-defense otherwise she never would have been able to break his hold on her earlier. Could he blame her for not trusting him? What the hell was he going to tell her? Whatever it was, he needed to do it quickly. They needed to leave. Now he understood why Daniels had always been so evasive.

He couldn't afford to be as cryptic as the temporal agent. He needed to censor the truth enough so that she would trust him. Pulling the UT from his pocket, Malcolm held it out to her.

Crossing her arms over her chest, she glared at him.

This was going to take some time, time they didn't have. He set the UT on the desk. "I'm from the future and that is a fully functional universal translator. You're currently working on one for Starfleet while you're not teaching."

Hoshi's eyes went from him to the object on the desk. Although most of her colleagues knew she was on leave from Starfleet, hardly anybody knew about her work for them. It really wasn't classified information, but it wasn't public knowledge. She really couldn't develop it without taking it out into the field. That's what her tour on Enterprise was for – to field test the temperamental piece of equipment.

He watched as she digested the information and realized she didn't believe him. "You're Ensign Hoshi Sato, assigned to Enterprise, under the command of Captain Jonathan Archer."

"So?"

Her reply was neutral yet defensive, but at least it wasn't hysterical. "You're supposed to leave in four weeks but the launch of Enterprise will be moved up by three weeks and…" Malcolm's voice softened to a whisper as he caught himself talking in the future tense. He needed to be careful.

"I haven't received any official notification the launch has been moved up," she replied, trying to keep her voice calm.

"You won't," Malcolm stated and immediately regretted his choice of words.

She was quick and made it to the door before he was able to catch her.

Tackling her around her legs, Malcolm flipped her over and quickly straddled her waist so she wouldn't inflict any embarrassing injuries. One thing he knew for sure is this woman fought dirty. She screamed and twisted her body violently beneath him, but he held on until she exhausted herself. He grimaced as she focused on his injured hand.

"You like pizza from Theorella's on Fountain Street," he blurted out, recalling the information from her journal entry about her time spent with Tarquin. "When you were a little girl, you didn't like your grandmother's soba noodles and you would tell her your stomach was upset whenever she tried to serve them. Now they're your favorite food!" Malcolm didn't add how Tarquin's violation of her memories had tainted her fondness for these items. Feeling her stop struggling, he started to release his grip.

After he released his grip and stood up, Hoshi crawled as far as she could away from him. "Who the hell are you? Is this some sort of joke?"

"I'm telling you the truth, Hoshi," he pleaded, hearing the PADD chirp in warning. They didn't have much time left before the Suliban realized he had shifted their target an hour into the future.

"If you're from the future, don't you have some sort of non-interference rule? Why do we have to leave? Don't you have all the time in the world, if you really can travel through time?" she added sarcastically.

"Yes. Because an alien race has been sent back to kill you. No," he answered all of her questions in order.

Hoshi stood up, her back against the door. "I'm still not going anywhere with you."

Malcolm's temper flared and he grabbed her wrist and pulled her to the desk. "Sit down," he barked and plugged in her computer terminal. "I'm Commander Malcolm Reed. I'm the armory officer on board Enterprise. Go ahead and look for yourself."

Pulling up the crew roster for Enterprise, she carefully called up the information. A picture of a younger version of the man standing in front of her flashed on her screen. "Says here you're a lieutenant."

"I got a promotion," he countered, his patience wearing thin.

"Did I?" she retorted.

Swearing under his breath, Malcolm stood up and started pacing in front of her. "Listen. I know this sounds far-fetched, but you've got to trust me. The work you do on the UT is vital to Earth's future. I can't say anything else. Your thread was corrupted the moment I met you last night and it's only going to get worse from here. You won't be able to finish out the semester. They'll find you."

"I can't leave my students!" she started to argue, shock setting in. The last hour was a nightmare and she was going to wake up any time now.

He grabbed her by her upper arms and hauled her to her feet. "You've got to trust me, Hoshi."

Her fearful eyes stared into his, the catch in his voice reaching a cord deep within her. She nodded.

--

A few hours later –

They had stopped long enough to leave a message at the university. It had been very cryptic and she had reluctantly appointed a substitute to take her place for the rest of the semester.

His mission was going better then he expected it to. Not only was Hoshi's life spared from the assassination attempt, it looked as though Hoshi would miss the opportunity to join Enterprise.

"Where are we going?" she asked, adjusting the baggy fold of her sweatshirt as they walked down a winding road.

Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed the stubborn tilt of her chin and the subtle pout of her lips. Maybe he had been a bit hasty by not letting her pack a few things, but he couldn't take any chances. By his count, there had been two Sulibans, and there was no way he could take both of them with just one phase pistol.

After Hoshi had called the university and requested the rest of the semester off, Malcolm had pulled her into the street, not really sure where they were headed. Needing currency, he stopped at a bank machine and pondered his next move.

"I asked where are we going," Hoshi grumbled, stopping a few feet away from him. "Am I going to get an answer?"

"I don't know yet," he replied, punching in his code and feeling a funny flutter run through his body as he altered his own timeline. He punched in a code and robbed himself of three months of salary. It was a minor incursion into his own thread, but he wouldn't miss the money. He really had no use for it anyway.

Hoshi gibed, "Wow! I can't tell you how happy I am my rescue was so well planned out."

Pocketing the credits, Malcolm turned to her and frowned. "You might want to take into consideration, Ensign, that I am a ranking officer in Starfleet and…"

"Don't even try pulling rank on me," she interrupted. "Besides, I'm not on active duty."

"Yet," he corrected, hiding his smile. He found her insolence refreshing. On Enterprise, she had always been so professional toward him. At least that is what he remembered of their time together.

"I really wish you would have let me change," she said, pulling on her baggy sweatshirt as she felt the sweat drip down her back.

Pulling the PADD out, he tapped on it. "We'll pick up some camping supplies and head to the river."

Hoshi stopped walking and started gaping at him. She shook her head. "Camping! Near the river? Are you crazy? There are snakes out there! I hate snakes!"

"Well, I hate the tropics," he added irritably, leading her down the main street and into a shop. "You've been through survival training. It's time you use it."

"I'm assuming we don't get along…when we actually do meet," Hoshi stated, trying to learn more about her future.

Malcolm threw a pair of shorts and a blue tank top at her and started walking toward a section where shoes were being sold. "I wouldn't know. If there is a paradoxical effect, it hasn't happened yet."

"What?" Hoshi caught the tank top, but dropped the shorts. She picked them up and followed him.

"Listen," Malcolm started, picking up a pair of hiking boots. "Mucking around in the past is dangerous business. So quit fishing for clues to the future. Trust me. You may be curious now, but I know you would prefer to leave some things a mystery."

Hoshi glared at him, snatching the boots he offered. "I like a good mystery, but not when it involves me being kidnapped." She stepped into a changing area.

While keeping an eye on the changing room, Malcolm roamed the store and bought more supplies. He knew he was still on tenuous ground with her and her cooperation was still debatable. Consulting the PADD, he found a secluded home along the river that was for rent. He didn't want to chance the mansion.

She stepped out of the stall, dressed in the khaki shorts, light blue tank top, and boots. She held her sweats and tennis shoes in her arms.

Picking up the bag, Malcolm walked up to her, trying to keep his eyes from lingering on her appealing curves. He grabbed her sweats and tennis shoes and threw them into a nearby garbage bin. "We're traveling light," he explained and walked away, expecting her to follow.

She stared at the clump of her favorite sweat suit in the garbage bin. Her abductor was waiting for her. By the tone of his voice, he was becoming more irritable. She grabbed her sweat suit and folded it over her arm. "I'll carry it," she said with a smile as she brushed past him.

Rolling his eyes, Malcolm started walking after her. This was going to be a long assignment.

-- TBC


	5. Chapter Four

Chapter Four –

Staring at the house, Hoshi scoffed, "This is your idea of camping?"

Malcolm stared at the stilted house and started climbing the stairs, his head pounding with each step he took. He had spent most of the afternoon arranging to rent the house for the week. He needed some sleep and he didn't feel like arguing with her anymore. "Look on the bright side. At least the snakes won't bother you."

Hoshi reached the top of the stairs. The house was about three stories high and appeared to include modern amenities. "And the tropical weather won't bother you," she retorted.

Unlocking the door, Malcolm headed toward the back of the house, intent on getting things done before he succumbed to the illness he felt nipping on his heels.

Hoshi looked around at the modestly furnished great room and kitchen area. There was a lanai with a hot tub and a pair of glass sliding doors on the other side. A small spiral staircase was in between the kitchen and the living area. Behind it was a dining area and a hall. She jumped when the house came to life and she felt stale air flow from the vent overhead. Her abductor had obviously found the electrical box.

Looking around, she realized he still hadn't come back. She eyed the stairs wearily, wondering if he was lurking about and waiting for her to run. Other than zapping her and wrestling her to the ground, he hadn't attempted to harm her. She didn't know what to believe. There was something there…something inherent she trusted. Besides, she had the advantage over him. She knew the area and they weren't far from the university.

Curiosity would be her undoing. The man claimed to have a fully functional UT. She should have grabbed it when she had the chance. It was obviously stolen. Once she got it back, she was going to make a break for it.

A noise at the back of the house caught her attention and she wandered down the hall and out the back door.

"Thanks, Pedro!" Malcolm shouted over the droning noise of a makeshift crank elevator.

The UT was on the ledge of the back patio area. He was openly using the stolen item. A large box rose past the deck and onto the ledge. Hoshi stood there, transfixed and looking from the UT to Malcolm. He was tugging on the box and in danger of knocking the UT off the ledge. Realizing what he was about to do, Malcolm grabbed the device and pocketed it.

He dropped the box onto the deck and started sliding it toward her. "I could use some help," he suggested, rubbing his hand, then the back of his neck.

He appeared pale. She looked at his pocket, wanting so to reach in there, grab the UT and start running. Running now would not be such a good idea. It was dusk, and she was not going to take her chances. Her escape would have to wait until tomorrow. Reluctantly, she bent over and helped dragged the box inside.

--

April 4th, wee hours of the morning –

Pacing the length of the upstairs bedroom, Hoshi cursed. He had been impossible, barley saying anything and pushing her upstairs as though demons were nipping on his heels to do so. The man had actually locked her in. Like she was going traipsing through the jungle at night! She had won one argument with him. In the event she needed to go to the bathroom, all she had to do was come downstairs. In order to do that, though, she would be setting off ten million alarms the bastard had set up.

Shit! She should have run when she had the chance and let the authorities deal with him. That bastard had her UT! There was no way she was just going to leave it behind. Hoshi wanted to pound something or throw something. The problem was that there wasn't anything to throw other than a pillow and a blanket. There was no furniture in the upstairs room. The bastard had taken the room with the king-sized bed and left her with an inflatable mattress on the floor.

There were sofas downstairs – pull out sofas. She could be sleeping comfortably on one of those, but he had forced her upstairs, "for her own protection."

More likely for his own protection, she thought vehemently.

A muffled shout from downstairs stopped her pacing. Who was he talking to? One thing for sure! She wasn't about to stay up here. Making her way down the spiral staircase, she waited for the alarms to sound. Reaching the bottom of the stairs, she frowned. That lying bastard! There was no alarm.

There were two voices now, one almost mechanical, yet feminine, and his. His sounded agitated.

Making her way down the hall, Hoshi could hear what the feminine was saying. "…outside established parameters. The catalyst is outside established parameters."

Hoshi pushed the door open. He was groaning now, writhing on top of the comforter and pillows. He looked exhausted even asleep, and mumbled incoherently.

"The catalyst is outside established parameters," the feminine voice informed from his PADD.

"…my fault," Malcolm moaned, twisting closer to the edge of the bed. "My fault you died."

He was fully clothed and obviously so tired he hadn't turned off any lights. A fine sheen of perspiration coated his forehead as he wrestled with invisible demons.

"Hoshi…" he rasped, eyes open, yet glazed with fever. "I'm so sorry. I –"

"The catalyst is outside established parameters," the computer continued.

" – wasn't there," Malcolm mumbled, reaching for the figure he thought was a ghost.

She sat on the bed, eying the UT on the nightstand and the feverish man on the bed. What the hell was going on? What was he talking about?

"It's infected," he stated coherently, referring to the bite on his hand. He didn't know how he was going to explain temporal displacement illness to her. That jaunt an hour into the future had cost him, not to mention the continued exposure to being in the past.

Hoshi backed away, startled.

Malcolm sat up, taking the PADD off the table and turning it off. "What do you want?"

She should be afraid of him, but she wasn't. He was in no condition to hold her captive. "Is there a first aid case in the supplies?"

"Yes," he said with a sigh and watched her leave. When he was sure she couldn't hear him, he turned the PADD back on. "Computer, pull up Hoshi's threads. Have there been any deviations in the recent thread."

The computer chirped, "Affirmative. The recent thread, slated to end yesterday, has been extended by ten percent, becoming a viable alternate. Currently, it is moving to intersect with –"

He turned the computer off when he heard Hoshi coming down the hall. His nightmares, part of the temporal displacement disorder, were new, revolving around the attempted assassination yesterday. He hadn't gotten there in time. He wasn't there, just like he wasn't there when the reptilians took her.

Hoshi walked into the room, carrying a bowl and first aid supplies. Silently, she took his hand, peeled the dirty bandage away from the wound and winced. She had definitely gotten her wish. It was infected. She placed his hand over the bowl.

He pulled his hand back when she started pouring peroxide over it, but she held it there.

"Don't be such a baby. It'll help," she chastised, rolling her eyes heavenward.

"It's not just the hand," he started to explain. "I'm experiencing time displacement disorder. It's not permanent, but it may take me a day or two to recover. I'll have a fever, and I want to be left alone."

Hoshi wrapped his hand and readied a hypospray. She injected it into his neck and set the bowl on the floor. "No," she stated simply.

"This isn't a game, Hoshi," he replied, wincing as he tried to sit up. The room started to spin as the paradoxical effects and his physicality collided. He would fall asleep soon and his nightmares would surface. He would reveal things without meaning too. She couldn't stay.

"If you're going to be running a fever, someone is going to need to give you fluids," she said over her shoulder as she took the bowl into the bathroom.

Having no time to argue with her, Malcolm relented into the blackness of sleep.

Washing her hands as she walked out of the bathroom, Hoshi stared at her would-be captor. He was asleep, his even breathing the only sound in the room. She walked over to the UT and picked it up. She wasn't going anywhere tonight.

--

She held the translator in the palm of her hand, still unable to believe the ramifications of what she had spent the entire night studying. This is what she always envisioned the UT to be. The translation matrix was vastly advanced compared to her working model. There were over a thousand alien languages in the database she had never heard of, but couldn't access. There was some kind of security feature on the blasted thing.

The sun rose over the treetops, casting shadows around her. Hoshi was so involved with the UT she had forgotten to check on the man who "saved" her.

Time travel – the fodder of science fiction movies, was not her field. Logic dictated time travel was an impossibility, but the evidence was slowly mounting in Malcolm's favor.

She set the UT down and got some water. Having not heard anything from him all night, Hoshi thought it better to just let him rest.

Pushing the door open, Hoshi stopped.

During the night, he had gotten up and taken his clothes off, and thankfully crawled underneath the sheet, which did little to conceal his state of undress.

Her eyes lingered on his bare chest, which was rising up and down evenly. Pulling the comforter up and over his waist, she nudged him awake. "It's time for you to drink something," she suggested softly, holding the water packet to his lips and trying to coax him awake.

She touched his chest and neck, both slick from sweat. "Malcolm," she stated firmly.

His eyes fluttered open, and confusion marred his features. "Hoshi?" his voice croaked.

"Drink this," she insisted, placing the straw to his lips.

Malcolm took the straw in his mouth weakly and started sipping the contents of the pouch. Finished, he pushed it away and closed his eyes. "You stayed."

"There are too many unanswered questions," she replied, and set the UT on the bedside table. "This is similar to what I'm working on, but way more advanced. Where did you get it?"

"It's not a question of where, Hoshi. It's a question of when," Malcolm said, his eyes opening and his stare riveting her to her seat.

-- TBC


	6. Chapter Five

Chapter Five --

Sitting up in bed, Malcolm took the water from Hoshi and sipped it steadily, shielding his eyes from the morning sun. "There are some things I won't be able to tell you…some things I don't know the answers to."

Hoshi remained silent, crossing her arms over her chest. "As I see it, you're in no condition to keep me here, so I would be as generous with the details as you can."

He could hardly contain the smirk that crossed his lips. This was the spitfire he had come to know and love. "I don't know where to start."

"How about the beginning," she stated simply. "Why are you here?"

Sighing, Malcolm sat up in bed. "Originally?"

Hoshi nodded.

"I'm here to prevent you from becoming communications officer on Enterprise."

Realizing this was going to be the equivalent of pulling teeth, Hoshi asked, "And?"

"Place the UT someplace viable so first contact missions go off without a hitch."

"Why do you need to stop me from joining Enterprise? If I'm not on Enterprise, how do I make the necessary upgrades to the UT?"

Malcolm grimaced at her question. He hated temporal mechanics and trying to explain them. "In my time…my string of reality…you're there, making the upgrades and contributing to the development of the UT. It's kind of an alternate reality."

Hoshi looked at him with a look of disbelief and little understanding.

"Look," he said, placing his hand on her shoulder. "Close your eyes and relax."

"Relax? You've got to be kidding me, right?" she retorted nervously.

"You're going to have to trust me sooner or later."

She scoffed. "Normally, I'm a very trusting person, but you have done nothing to inspire me to trust you. First, you accost me. Then you shoot me with your ray gun. Then you tackle me. Then – "

"All of which could have been avoided if you had just listened to me in the first place."

They glared at one another as silence surrounded them.

"You want the truth?" Malcolm asked finally. "I was sent to prevent you from joining Enterprise…to try to convince you to resign from Starfleet. But –"

"You already said that," Hoshi replied impatiently.

Malcolm closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and tried to continue.

"For all I know you're some stalker –"

"The meeting in the bar was unintentional," Malcolm growled, losing control of his temper. He pulled her onto his lap and covered her mouth. "If you would just be quiet long enough so that I could tell you what you want to know…"

Her scream was muffled under his hand, and she tried to twist away from him.

"Trip was right about you," Malcolm chuffed, struggling to keep her under control. "Outside Starfleet regulations, it is impossible to shut you up."

Hoshi stilled, realizing she wasn't going to get away from him, and he started to relax his hold.

"I didn't know how I was going to approach you," he started to explain again. "I was running scenarios when the computer alerted me about the attempt on you life. You can't go back to the university. They'll find you."

"Who?"

He barley heard the muffled question and removed his hand. How was he going to explain the Suliban?

Crawling away from him across the bed, she straightened. "Why do they want to kill me?"

"I don't know, Hoshi. I can only hypothesize as to their motives," he lied.

"Why now?" she asked softly, feeling tears of frustration threaten.

He shook his head.

Grabbing the UT, she shoved it toward him. "What about this?"

Seeing the frustration in her eyes, Malcolm took the UT and placed it on the bed. He took her hands in his. "Close your eyes and relax."

He smoothed his palms over hers and she laughed nervously.

"You're not going to read my palms now, are you?"

Malcolm laughed. "No. I know time travel is confusing. I'm trying to give you a mental picture."

Hoshi squirmed uncomfortably and closed her eyes. Instead of a mental picture of time travel, a vision of him asleep in the bed passed through her mind.

"Close your eyes and picture a rope, suspended in murky water."

She opened her eyes and looked at him like he was crazy.

"It's either this or a tech manual," he said.

Sighing, Hoshi closed her eyes.

Convinced she was relaxed enough to "think outside the box," Malcolm continued. "Look closely at the rope, as though you're looking at it through a microscope. The fibrous networks of material weave together and fray. Each twine is a possibility, an alternate reality. The frayed ends represent endings. There are limitless possibilities."

Opening her eyes, Hoshi stared into his. She could see the representation, but had no point of origin she could comprehend. "It's so confusing. How do you make sense of any of it?"

"I don't," Malcolm stated emphatically. "Time travel has driven several people crazy. You just have to make your own sense of it."

"So your rope is…"

"The way I look at the possibilities," he said, unconsciously rubbing her hands in his.

--

Hoshi's line of questioning had lasted through the morning and well into the afternoon. By early evening, Hoshi finally fell asleep and Malcolm took advantage of the opportunity to shower. Physically, he was better. Mentally, he was shaken.

His bout of temporal displacement disorder had subsided for now, but had left an unwanted side effect. While he had slept, he had dreamt -- but the nightmares he was so accustomed to had never arrived. Instead, his dreams were filled with Hoshi. Whether the dreams were alternates or just wishful thinking, he would never know.

In one dream, she had come on board Enterprise dressed in the blue tank top and khaki shorts she wore now. In another, she was asking him what his favorite food was and flirting with him like she had been flirting with him in the bar.

And in another dream, he overheard her talking to herself, saying how it hurt being around him and not being able to do anything about the attraction she had for him.

But the most memorable dream of all was how she looked after she returned from Risa. She never did look him in the eye and he could have sworn he saw a slow blush creep up her neck when he asked how her trip was.

Some of the dreams seemed so real, like they had been actual parts of his life. Others seemed bizarre, like her rescue from the Xindi probe. Shaking the thoughts from his head, Malcolm stepped out of the shower.

His main focus now was to keep her alive – but for how long? Were the Suliban going to stop looking for her once the event horizon passed? Would she ever be truly safe – safe to live the happy life he'd always envisioned for her? He knew her pursuers were still here – the computer had not informed him of another shift.

Drying off, Malcolm pulled his shorts on. Either way, he wasn't going back until they were gone.

He walked out of the bathroom and stopped in his tracks. Hoshi was sitting on the edge of the bed with the UT in her hand.

"I've resigned myself that I won't get any big answers from you, so how about little ones?" Hoshi asked, running her hands over the UT as though it were alive.

"I thought you were asleep."

"There's just something about being kidnapped by somebody claiming to be from the future that's a bit unsettling on the nerves. Wouldn't you agree?" she asked softly, her eyes dropping to his chest.

"There's a sleep aid in the supplies," Malcolm replied. "Maybe you should try some."

She shrugged and got off the bed. "I've been looking at the UT and wanted to ask you some questions."

"Why? I won't answer them," he replied, holding his hands up in surrender. "My knowledge of how the UT actually works is very limited, so I probably won't be able to answer your questions."

"Why do I not find that surprising," Hoshi sighed. "You obviously aren't one to sweat the details."

His roar of laughter probably could have been heard a mile away. He should be insulted, but he wasn't. She didn't know him very well yet.

Tossing the UT aside, she watched the play of muscle on his back as he pulled a shirt over his head. "So…um…do I have any children in the future?"

Malcolm stilled. "Yes and no," he replied, referring to their time with the other Enterprise and feeling a spark of jealousy as he thought of the father of her children.

Hoshi threw her hands in the air in exasperation, and she decided to ask him a more direct approach. After all, what did she have to lose? "Do we become lovers?"

"No," he called over his shoulder as he beat a hasty retreat to the kitchen.

Following him, Hoshi stated, "Pity."

Malcolm laughed again, knowing she was flirting with him again. "I'm your superior officer, Ensign. It's against regulations." Opening a cupboard, he took two ration packs out and tossed one to her. "Are you hungry?"

Hoshi set hers down, walked toward him, and smiled. "Since we aren't going to be serving together –"

"Don't, Hoshi," he whispered harshly, looking at her in a way that quieted her. The playful mood was gone for him, replaced with the familiar ache of loving her all these years.

TBC --

A/N -- This is my shameless plug for feedback. Insert puppy dog eyes here.


	7. Chapter Six

A/N -- Many thanks to Exploded Pen and Strance for the feedback. May I have some more please?

Chapter Six –

She had seen that look before – the one that longed for something. She had seen it across the room in the bar the night they met. "You're changing my future. Don't I have a right to know about the one I'll never have?"

Looking away, Malcolm took her rations pack and ripped it open. "You need to eat something."

She stared from the food to him. Even though she was hungry, she wanted answers more. "I'd ask a simple question like 'Am I dead'? But everybody dies sooner or later."

Malcolm remained silent, opening his ration pack and taking a bite of a protein bar.

"Since you only look a little older than the Starfleet ID picture I saw yesterday, I'm assuming that something bad happened," she said, staring at him.

He felt the mouthful of food turn to chalk and he paled. He knew one thing he would never tell her – her role in the destruction of Earth.

"You would make a lousy poker player, Malcolm," Hoshi continued. "I'm obviously dead."

Malcolm swallowed his food and pushed it away, the reality of her words striking deep within him. Somehow he had kidded himself. From this point on her life would never be normal.

"Sooner than I would have liked," she whispered, trying to make light of her fate. "But I've led a good life."

"That's a rather fatalistic view of things," Malcolm replied, scraping back his chair and standing up, needing to distance himself from her.

"You didn't come all this way just to save me, did you?"

Snapping, he crossed the distance between them, grabbed her shoulders and shook her. "Stop it," he pleaded. "You'll go crazy if you dwell on it. You're on a different thread now. There is no such thing as fate or destiny." He pulled her into his arms and she yielded to him.

His own words barely made sense to him and he doubted she could fathom what he was talking about. He was hoping the effects of the temporal displacement disorder were the result of the quick shift into the future yesterday, but it was looking like it was a long term condition. It was only a matter of time before the insanity claimed him.

She sniffled, finally giving in to the frustration and crying.

Squeezing her tighter, he brushed his lips across her hair. "Damn the Xindi. Damn the Suliban. And damn Jonathan Archer to hell."

--

Later that night –

He was missing something. The perimeter of the house was secure – one way up and one way down. That's why he chose the house. It was easily secured, and it was available. The Suliban, although genetically advanced, would not be able to get into the house without using the stairs. Malcolm scoffed. Damn, he was paranoid. There was no way they would be able to track Hoshi here.

Paranoia and obsession – two traits he hated, yet embraced. He was obsessed with protecting her. But his paranoia was a double-edged sword. He had to keep her close to save her. In keeping her close, how long would he be able to dodge her leading questions? How would he explain if she ever guessed the truth?

Malcolm pulled the PADD across the table and tapped on the screen, pulling up her threads. Perhaps they would come alive and tell him what he needed to do.

He stared at the spiral-like thread that represented the current present. His focus blurred as he stared at the nonsensical strand. It looped and twisted so haphazardly, Malcolm's feeling of dread grew exponentially. What had he done to her? Why was this happening?

More questions churned in his head as he watched Hoshi's lines. Was he ever going to be able to stabilize the sequential events of her life? There were new ones out there for her. There had to be. He just had to find them.

__

_What if there aren't any happily-ever-after threads out there for her?_ a little voice niggled.

"There has to be," he replied out loud.

Ar_e you willing to spend the rest of your life searching?_

He could feel irrationality encroaching on his reason as the never-ending line of questioning and self-doubt started.

__

Will she go insane before or after you do?

Shaking off the effects of sleep deprivation, temporal displacement disorder, and hopelessness, Malcolm tried to concentrate. There had to be something he had missed.

In his mind, the threads swirled around one another, constricting and releasing. They became one and followed the theoretical horizontal line that temporal theorists were always arguing about. Then it hit him.

Hoshi would never be safe here. They had to move quickly to counteract the current thread. He had gone too far back. There was no need to negate her role in the development of the UT. He only had to negate her role in the destruction of Earth. He only needed to –

"Warning!" the computer chirped. "Perimeter has been breached by two non-humanoid life forms."

"Bloody hell!" Malcolm cursed, snatching the PADD and bolting for the door. "Time to intercept?"

"Five minutes," informed the computer.

Knowing how quickly Suliban moved, they were not far away and there was no chance of getting down the stairs without running into them. He ran down the hall and threw the door open.

Hoshi did not stir.

"Hoshi! Wake up! We've got to go!" Malcolm shouted, grabbing her boots.

She sat up in bed, confused and groggy. "Wh- what?"

"They're here, Hoshi," Malcolm explained, grabbing her foot and shoving one of her hiking boots on.

For her, the statement was surreal as sleep still mired her consciousness. "Can't you just shoot them with your ray gun?"

"Damn it, Hoshi! Wake up!" He shook her, then put her other boot on.

"I'm tired," she sighed, looking at the packet on the nightstand and rolling over to go back to sleep.

"Bugger!" He grabbed the package and looked at it. She had taken a sleep aid. He put the package down and pocketed the UT. Picking her up, he carried her to the back patio. He set her down roughly.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" she complained half-heartedly, trying to shake the sleepy feeling and shivering in the cool night air.

Malcolm walked away and stooped down.

She heard an unfamiliar squeak as he turned a spigot on. What was he doing? She watched curiously as he dowsed himself in the frigid water.

"Turn around!" he barked.

She looked at him like he had gone insane, then she watched as he turned the hose on her.

"This will interfere with their tracking sensors, and it will help you wake up," he tried to explain, grabbing her and putting his hand over her mouth. "Be quiet."

She squirmed against him as the water soaked her through top and shorts. She sputtered and coughed, unable to form a coherent thought. Then she felt her world spin again as he lifted her in his arms and set her on the edge of the patio. He nudged her and she clutched the ledge. "Do you expect me to jump?" she asked, then felt something under her foot. It was the little crank elevator she had seen him using yesterday.

His hand guided hers to a rope. It was dark and she heard someone ascending the stairs.

Adrenaline had set in and the instinct to flee guided his actions. "I'm going to cut the line and we're going to ride it down," he stated calmly, climbing onto the ledge.

Panicked, Hoshi looked at Malcolm and nodded, hearing the footsteps get closer.

"When you hit the ground, run to the university. If we get separated, take a shuttle to Enterprise and stay there. If anybody asks, just tell them you've come to check on the UT installations," Malcolm instructed quickly.

"Right," she agreed, hearing the footsteps getting closer.

Malcolm cut the rope and they rode the elevator platform down to the ground.

Something popped and she felt a burning sensation in her leg. She slapped at her leg and cursed, "Damn bugs!"

"Are you okay?"

"Yes," she replied, looked up at the house and seeing two human figures peer over the side.

A flash of light lit the night and hit one of the shadowed pursuers, causing the other to jump back.

Malcolm holstered his phase pistol, grabbed her hand and tugged. "Run!"

They sprinted into the jungle, Hoshi no longer looking over her shoulder as fear of the shadowy figures raced through her mind. This was real. Somebody was after her.

"Keep running!" Malcolm shouted, pulling on her hand. "We're almost there."

They broke through to a clearing – the outermost edge of the university. In the clearing were two shuttlepods, which the university's interstellar space program used for field studies.

Malcolm looked over his shoulder and saw no signs of pursuit. Holding his phase pistol in front of him, he targeted the bushes.

"Professor?"

Hoshi jumped and turned around.

Her student, Pun Jab, walked away from one of the shuttles. He was in the engineering department and had obviously been working on the shuttle. "We heard you had some sort of family emergency. Is everything okay?" he asked, looking at her appearance.

She tried calming her nerves to talk.

"Professor Sato?" Pun Jab questioned, looking from her to Malcolm, who was still looking at the bushes, waiting for something to jump out.

"Pun Jab," Hoshi sighed, trying to catch her breath. "We need to borrow your shuttle."

"But –" the man started to argue.

"It's official Starfleet business," Malcolm intervened, brushing past Pun Jab and into the shuttle.

Pun Jab gaped. "But, but, there's p-paperwork and, and – "

Hoshi pressed her fingers over his lips. "Don't worry, Pun Jab. We'll have the shuttle back to you in no time."

Pun Jab shook his head in disbelief as he watched his teacher trail behind the strange man. If she wanted to have a zero-g tryst with the guy she picked up in the bar, she really should have given him more warning.

Closing the hatch behind her, Hoshi settled into the seat next to the pilot's chair.

Malcolm flipped several switches and readied the shuttle for flight.

"You do know how to fly this thing, don't you?" she asked.

He gave her a look that would have killed her where she stood if looks were an actual weapon.

She shrugged. "Well, I've only had the basics of shuttle flight and I'm not familiar with this model."

"Yes," he replied shortly.

The shuttle leapt into the air and Malcolm set a course for the warp five complex. It wasn't until they had broken through the atmosphere that Hoshi started asking more questions.

"Was it really necessary to hose me down?" she sniffled and punched his shoulder.

He paid little attention to the throb in his shoulder. "I did it to confuse their sensors," he informed her. "There are various life forms in the jungle. Their external sensors were looking for normal human bio temperatures. Plus I needed you to wake up."

"And what about preventing me from joining Enterprise?" she asked, raising her hand to hit him again.

"Do not hit me again," he warned, monitoring the shuttle's systems.

Heeding his warning, Hoshi hit the console. "Well? Why are you taking me to Enterprise?"

"I've come too far back into the past," Malcolm muttered with no intention of explaining himself further.

Hoshi stood up and started pacing the cramped space. "That's just great!" she shouted. "Don't you think before you act? You've totally corrupted my personal…personal…" She struggled for the right terminology.

"Timeline," Malcolm suggested.

"That's it," she agreed, snapping her fingers and limping as she paced.

Frowning, Malcolm looked at her. "What's wrong?"

Hoshi stopped pacing and turned. "What?"

"You're limping," he observed, pushing her down into the nearest seat and kneeling in front of her. He took her ankle in his hands and turned it slightly to look at the red welt on the side of her leg.

"Ouch," she grumbled, trying to pull away from him. "That hurts, you know."

He reached for his PADD and tapped in some commands.

"Medical subroutines activated. Scanning," the computer droned.

"It's just a stupid bug bite," she said, still trying to pull away from him.

"Will you hold still?" he growled, pinning her against the shuttle wall – his forearm beneath the underside of her breasts.

Hoshi nodded, feeling a flush creep up her neck.

"When did this happen?" he asked, backing away and waving the PADD over the swollen area.

Hoshi breathed a sigh of relief, her mind a puddle of desirous wants she chose to ignore. "Right when we hit the ground, leaving the house."

The computer chirped, "Xanal poison detected. Recommended antidote is thirty ccs of palan oil mixed with ten ccs of jagalox extract, administered through hypospray every eight hours for three days. If dosage is started within seventy-two hours of initial exposure, patient recovery will be one hundred percent. Failure to administer dosage results in death. Xanal poison is from the Suliban system and –"

Hoshi's eyes widened.

Malcolm swore. Malcolm swore, the desperate feeling of losing her again closing in on him.


	8. Chapter Seven

Chapter Seven –

"I'm going to die?"

He could hear the shock and panic in Hoshi's voice. "You're not going to die," he said, grabbing her shoulders and shaking her. "I won't let you. Not again."

Hoshi eye's sparked as she looked into his, her anger boiling to the surface. She batted away his hands and swung at him. "Why couldn't you leave me alone?" Her fist connected with his chest.

Malcolm stumbled back and she followed him to the floor. Straddling his hips, she pounded his chest. She ranted, her ramblings incoherent.

He caught her wrists and rolled them over, him straddling her now. "You aren't going to die," he repeated, this time with more conviction.

The sudden shift of orientation startled her and she listened to him.

"I'm going to take you to Enterprise. You'll be safe there. You'll get treatment there," he stated calmly.

Anger flashed in her eyes, but she started to relax underneath him. "Why did you come back for me?"

Malcolm adjusted his hold on her and held both her wrists in one of his hands. _Because I love you_, he wanted to say, but opted to brush her hair out of her face. "I wanted to save you. I wanted –"

"What, Malcolm? What do you want?" she asked softly.

Closing his eyes, he held his breath.

When he didn't respond, she said, "I fail to see how one person can make such a difference. Why did you come back for me?"

"You're important," he answered vaguely.

"To whom?" Hoshi retorted, trying to pull her wrists from his hand and succeeding. She could see the torment in his eyes and needed an answer.

This is crazy. He didn't have time for this, but she took the decision out of his hands as she reached up and pulled him to her.

Their lips met, hesitant at first and questioning.

It was the spark Malcolm needed as he crushed her to the floor, running his tongue along the edge of her lips and groaning as she opened for him. The dreamlike quality spurred his desire as he shifted over her, thrusting his leg between hers.

Hoshi opened for him willingly, tugging his shirt from his shorts and running her hands over his stomach. She moaned her acceptance, thrusting up and grinding her hips against him.

He could feel her heat against his. All he had to do was peel her shorts and panties down, undo his shorts and take her.

The shuttle terminal beeped. "Warp five complex to unknown shuttle, you are in restricted space. Change your vector or we will open fire."

Malcolm stood up and pulled Hoshi with him. "Give them your clearance code and request permission to dock."

Hoshi took a shuddering breath and pressed the com panel. "This is Ensign Hoshi Sato, clearance code Beta Charlie Omega Five, requesting permission to dock with Enterprise."

A long pause followed and Malcolm sat down in the pilot's chair. The warp five complex had verified her clearance by now and should be contacting him to get clearance from Enterprise.

Hoshi sat in the chair next to him, looking straight ahead.

Out of the corner of his eye, he looked at her. She was dressed in the blue tank top and shorts he bought her the other day, and the dream he had suddenly made sense. In his dream, he was confused by her early arrival and even more baffled by her attire.

"Just head to the quartermaster and get some uniforms." Malcolm adjusted the controls as the order to proceed was given. "It will be disconcerting for you," he explained. "When you step out of the airlock, I'll be standing there, waiting to great you…and suspicious of your sudden appearance."

She looked at him confused.

"I'm a difficult person to get to know. Don't try to," he continued. "Just be professional and aloof. Don't mention any of this to me or the threads will come undone." _And I'll go insane._

"Professional and aloof," she agreed, trying to listen to his instructions.

The shuttle pulled alongside Enterprise and a voice with a familiar accent called over the com station. "Ensign, we weren't expecting you until the end of the month. The Captain isn't –"

"I've come to oversee the installation of the UT, sir," she interrupted.

"— available," Malcolm said over the com, sounding irritated he had been interrupted. "Please pilot your shuttle to the starboard dock. I'll meet you there."

The com link went dead.

"Just stay close to the UT when you aren't in your quarters," Malcolm started. "I'll send the antidote as soon as possible. According to the computer, you shouldn't start feeling the effects until day after tomorrow."

The shuttle gave a slight jar as docking procedures were completed.

"I – I'm scared," Hoshi admitted, frozen in her chair.

"You'll do fine," Malcolm calmed. "Just remember my instructions. Stay on Enterprise and you'll be safe. Away missions are fine too, as long as I am with you. Stay close to me on away missions. Do not leave Enterprise without the Captain or me. Do you understand?"

She looked at him, shaking. Her clammy clothes were sticking to her like a second skin.

Malcolm pulled her up from the seat and led her to the hatch. Carefully opening it, he pushed her through to the airlock. "You'll be okay," he repeated. "Just remember what I've told you." He closed the hatch.

Stepping into the airlock, Hoshi listened to the unfamiliar sounds – the sounds of her new home, Enterprise. A loud click and a hiss signaled the release of the shuttle and she turned to watch her…savior…fly away. Another click and a hiss and the hatch from the airlock to Enterprise slid open.

Hoshi shivered, her stomach churning and her nervousness showing.

"Ensign?" the oh-so-familiar British lilt called out.

Squaring her shoulders, she stepped over the threshold and looked into shocked, yet familiar azure eyes. "Lieutenant," she acknowledged. The man standing before her was the same man she had just left – just younger. The reality of the last few days finally settled into the pit of her stomach.

Malcolm stared at Enterprise's new communications officer. To say she was not what he expected would be an understatement. She looked as though she had just showered with her clothes on, her spaghetti-strap top plastered to her breasts, leaving little to his imagination. She looked pale and wet.

"Are you feeling well?" he asked.

Seeing his summation of her appearance in his eyes, she explained, "Yes. It was raining when I boarded the shuttle. You know how Macapa can be." The confused look on his face spurred her to continue. "Brazil…the rain forest."

"No, I wouldn't know," he stated dryly. "I don't really care for humid climates." He frowned, becoming more irritated. Commander Tucker was too busy polishing handrails, much less making sure his armory components made it onboard, to fulfill his role as first officer, so he got stuck greeting the new arrival. "Are your things in the airlock?" he asked, peering over her shoulder.

"My things are being sent shortly," she replied.

Malcolm gave her a curious stare, then motioned for her to follow him. What the hell did she think this was, a pleasure cruise? "Do you have the coordinates of your things?" he asked coolly.

Hoshi stared at his back, her eyes lingering on his backside. She could hear the annoyance in his voice. "No. Is that a problem?"

He cleared his throat and stepped onto the turbolift. "Your quarters are on E-deck," he paused. "It's just that the ship's quartermaster doesn't report for another week and supplies are limited to engineering components and ration packs."

"Oh," Hoshi replied, blushing. _It's your damn fault anyway!_

Malcolm mentally checked off the list of crewman on board and no one came close to her size except him. Bloody hell! Not only had his account been broken into, but now he had to part with a uniform and boots. He would have to dip into his savings to replace the uniform, undergarments, and boots. There was no way he would want them back. "I suppose you could borrow…have one of my uniforms. I'll have it sent directly."

__

Don't do me any favors, Malcolm, she thought to herself. "Thank you, Lieutenant."

Malcolm stopped and pressed a code into a panel. "These are your quarters."

She gave her best imitation of a smile, hoping he would just leave. Her nerves were frayed and her stomach churned. But he followed her into the cabin and started throwing switches. By the time he was done, she swore every light in the room was on.

Satisfied her cabin was fully functional, Malcolm flipped the light to her bathroom on. "I'll send some towels and…"

She started turning off some lights and felt exhaustion settle over her. She would have given in and collapsed on the sheet-less bunk, but her stomach wouldn't calm down.

"Is something wrong, Ensign?" he asked curiously.

"I – I –" Hoshi pushed him into the bathroom against the shower stall. Bending over the toilet, she grabbed the sides and started vomiting.

Malcolm turned his head.

Thankfully, the contents of her stomach were non-existent and she righted herself quickly. She went to the sink and rinsed her mouth out, a new panic sitting in. Was the poisoning already taking effect?

"Are you ill, Ensign?"

Still bowing her head, she rolled his eyes. How daft could he be? She spit into the sink. "I'm fine. Thank you. I'm sorry about shoving you in here, Lieutenant. I guess I'm just getting used to the artificial gravity."

She looked at him in the mirror, her eyes haunted…or was it hunted, and he chided himself for being too harsh in his assessment of her.


	9. Chapter Eight

Chapter Eight –

Scanning the ledger at the Interspecies Medical Exchange, Malcolm frowned. Phlox had better be here. Hoshi didn't have much time left.

Too much time had already passed. After returning the shuttle to the university, he had hopped the fastest transport to San Francisco. Now he stood in front of the ledger, ready to kidnap the only person who could synthesis a substitute antidote for Hoshi.

In hindsight, Malcolm realized why the Suliban hadn't followed them into the jungle. Hoshi was as good as dead. They had tagged her with Xanal poison – a poison from the future. There was no way to get the serum ingredients for chemicals modern medicine had yet to encounter.

Hurriedly, his eyes scanned the listing, and he pressed the elevator button to the third floor. The myriad images of the last few days played in his mind. There were so many questions – too many what-ifs. If he had only handled things differently…if he had only been there when Hoshi had been taken.

The elevator opened and he walked down the hall. Phlox's office door slid open and a young woman greeted him, "Can I help you?"

"Is the doctor in?" Malcolm asked quickly.

"Yes," she replied with a smile. "Do you have an appointment?"

Malcolm walked past the receptionist without answering.

"Sir!" she shouted.

The door opened and Malcolm walked in, startling the man who sat behind the desk. "I need your help."

"Dr. Phlox, I'm so sorry, I –" the receptionist apologized, running over to her boss.

Phlox stared at Malcolm, his eyes wide with curiosity.

Malcolm placed his PADD on Phlox's desk and slid it closer to the doctor. "I need an antidote to counteract the following compound."

The receptionist ran off.

Glancing at the PADD, the Denobulan's eyebrows quirked.

Hearing the receptionist's panicked voice calling for security, Malcolm started explaining. "I know this is going to sound impossible, but I'm from the future. I've been sent back to prevent…something. Another race with the ability to time travel is trying to assassinate a…key figure. The poison has been delivered and the subject will die in approximately thirty hours."

Phlox's eyes widened and he glanced down at the information again.

Malcolm held his breath. A clatter in the waiting room signaled the arrival of a security detail and he placed his hand over his phase pistol, ready to stun anybody who got in his way.

"Is everything okay, Dr. Phlox?" a curious voice asked from the doorway.

Phlox grinned. "Yes," he replied. "You may leave." He motioned for Malcolm to have a seat. "Mister –"

"Reed," Malcolm supplied, but didn't take the seat.

"Mr. Reed and I were just sitting down for a patient consultation." Phlox leaned on his desk. "Could you please close the door behind you?"

The door clicked shut behind him and Malcolm moved his hand away from the phase pistol.

Picking up the PADD, Phlox studied the screen and tsked. "How far in the future are you from?" he asked as though discussing the weather.

Malcolm shifted uncomfortably.

Phlox shrugged, realizing the man before him would only divulge enough information to get what he wanted. "My colleague, Dr. Reasl studies cellular degeneration and he theorizes that time travel is possible given – "

"Can you synthesize an antidote?" Malcolm interrupted.

Unperturbed by the man's manners, Phlox studied the information on the PADD again before rendering a decision. "This compound is similar to a rare Orion aphrodisiac, which paralyzes a partner for sexual purposes. It's primarily used in brothels for role playing – "

"Can you do it? Will it counteract the poison?"

"How long has the person been exposed to the toxin? What species are they?"

"Approximately six hours. Human," Malcolm said.

Phlox frowned. "Why are you unable to get the regular serum for this…Xanal poison? I've never heard of the ingredients for the serum."

"Xanal poison is from a solar system Denobulans haven't been to yet," Malcolm tried explaining.

The doctor stared at Mr. Reed. "I do have the items in my lab needed to synthesis the antidote for the Orion compound, but I would need to run some tests before I could approximate the appropriate dosage of this…Xanal poisoning."

"How long?" Malcolm asked abruptly.

Standing, Phlox opened the door and motioned for Malcolm to follow him. "I'll know if I can synthesis the necessary proteins within twenty-four hours. Then it may take another day or two for the cultures to grow."

--

She studied the components, her back sore from lying there and staring up at the underside of the UT console. Who the hell put this thing together? It was a disgrace.

"Damn!" she yelled, not really caring if anybody heard her. The skeleton crew of engineering and armory personnel was probably asleep anyway.

Yanking a wire and shocking herself, Hoshi shouted again. "Shit!"

"What are you doing, Ensign?"

A loud crack reverberated around the bridge, and Hoshi felt a knot rising on her forehead. "Fuck!"

Grabbing her by an ankle, Malcolm pulled her from beneath the console. "I'm sure Commander Tucker would not be appreciative of you pulling the wiring out of the UT," he stated irritably.

Lack of sleep coupled with strained nerves finally won out, and Hoshi's sensible side vanished. "Commander Tucker doesn't know what the hell he's doing," she replied, rising to her stocking feet. The uniform Crewman Rostov had brought her was a little baggy, but the boots were a total loss.

"Commander Tucker is a very capable chief engineer and – "

"Commander Tucker not only put the translation matrix in backwards -- it's upside down. The wiring is all wrong and –"

"—your superior officer, as am I."

She looked at him as though seeing him for the first time. A blush rose in her cheeks as Malcolm's words repeated in her mind. She was to act as though she didn't know him and she was acting anything but. She tossed the spanner into the chair. "My apologies, sir."

He eyed her warily. Her eyes were glassy and wild and her cheeks were flushed. She looked feverish. "Come with me."

Malcolm gave no room for argument and held the turbolift door open for her.

Hoshi followed silently, her mind blank…her ability to concentrate gone.

When the turbolift door opened, she closed her eyes, trying to keep the hallway in front of her from spinning. She clutched the side of the doorway and tried to follow the lieutenant, but sank to her knees instead.

"Ensign!" he called out in alarm, putting an arm around her waist.

She muttered something, and her head lolled to one side.

Dragging her into sickbay, he laid her on the nearest biobed, then started digging for a medical tricorder. He broke the seal on the new equipment and waved it over her body. Her temperature was thirty-nine point four degrees Celsius and rising. Malcolm strapped her to the table and hit the com unit. "Lieutenant Reed to Commander Tucker."

Malcolm glanced over at the unconscious woman and waited for a reply.

A groggy, accented voice finally replied. "What is it now, Malcolm?"

"We have a medical emergency in sickbay."

"Contact the complex and see if they can spare their doctor," Trip ordered. "I'll be right there."

TBC --


	10. Chapter Nine

Chapter Nine –

Malcolm watched the doctor run meticulous scans and nod at the results. He had downloaded the necessary medical information into Phlox's computer, not really giving a damn about potential ramifications for the future.

Rubbing his now bloodshot eyes, Malcolm yawned, the lack of sleep over the past twenty-four hours catching up to him. He was still waiting for a more definitive answer from Phlox, but he had already guessed at the outcome.

During the last few hours, he had watched Hoshi's thread weave around the one he had always known. Although it was fluidic, it was close enough to the original thread to give him hope – hope that he had bought her enough time.

He placed his head on the counter to rest and waited for Phlox's solution, unknowingly slipping into a restless sleep.

__

"I'm sorry, Lieutenant. The captain is still hasn't appointed a CMO yet," Trip informed him through the window between observation and decon. Dr. Proffitt says it looks like influenza, and we just need to keep her temperature under control…not to mention keep her isolated."

__

Leaning against the window, Malcolm frowned. "But Commander…I haven't the time to play nursemaid, and –"

"Keep your shirt on, Lieutenant," the engineer admonished. "Your parts aren't even in and we've got plenty of time to install the armory systems. Besides, if she does have something contagious, you've been exposed."

Malcolm blustered at his commanding officer's retreating back. "This is just bloody wonderful," he ranted at no one in particular for he was alone except for the unconscious woman behind him.

He leaned against the wall and glared at her, his animosity toward her growing. First, she arrives unannounced. Then she doesn't bring anything with her. Now she's ill and he's stuck with her.

Here he was – a senior officer on board Earth's warp five flagship with an absentee captain and a first officer who liked to delegate. This was just too bloody brilliant. Enterprise was to make her maiden voyage in less than a month and none of the weapons systems was online. He had some components, but not all of them. Hell, they were fortunate the grav-plating was installed.

He sat next to the ensign and ran a hand through his hair in frustration.

__

"Poison," he heard her whisper in her sleep, clearly caught up in the throes of the fever.

"Mr. Reed?"

Malcolm woke with a start and looked around, disoriented.

"Did you hear me, Mr. Reed?" asked Phlox as he adjusted his microscope.

"N-no," Malcolm muttered, his thoughts still enmeshed in the dream.

"I've isolated the proteins and started work on the cultures. With any luck, I should be able to counteract the effects of the poison," the doctor announced happily.

"H- how long was I asleep? How long have you been working?" Malcolm rattled off the questions and stretched his arms over his head. Was the dream an altered reality? Was he slipping into a lingering temporal psychosis?

"I didn't realize you were asleep," the Denobulan replied. "So I don't know how long. I've been working on the antidote for four hours, and we are well ahead of schedule. Now I we just have to wait for the cultures to grow."

"How long will that take?"

"At least twenty-four hours," Phlox stated, then grew unusually contemplative.

Malcolm sighed. The wide, suggestive look the Denobulan gave him made him smirk. It was the "we've got the time so why not tell me what's going on" look.

"I'm particularly fond of the green jello they serve in the cafeteria," announced Phlox as though he was in the middle of a conversation. "Would you care to join me?"

Malcolm followed him, realizing there was little point staying in the lab and watching the cultures grow.

They walked down the silent, dimly lit halls, Malcolm's apprehension assuaged. He knew Phlox could do it. The antidote would be delivered and Hoshi would recover – the memories of their time together firmly ingrained in his consciousness. Those memories were the only thing keeping him sane.

The assassins were still out there. But they would never risk a direct attack on Enterprise. Hoshi would be safe as long as she followed his instructions.

His choices made, Malcolm followed Phlox to a table, his eyes lingering on the numerous selections of green jello on the doctor's tray.

Spearing the wiggly food, Phlox slurped his first mouthful and smiled. "Once the antidote is ready, where shall I send it?"

Chewing his sandwich, Malcolm swallowed. "To Dr. Proffitt at the warp five complex. Tell her you examined Hoshi…Ensign Hoshi Sato a week before she left, and you suspected she had the beginnings of some rare tropical disease."

Phlox set his fork down. "I know Dr. Proffitt. I'm sure she won't mind the hourly administration of the antidote, although the complex is terribly understaffed. I'll never understand Earth's political system. Although I must admit to being somewhat disappointed. I was hoping to meet the patient. Is the Ensign from the future too?"

He laughed. At least the doctor was subtle compared to Hoshi. "I wondered when you were going to start asking questions again."

Smiling his trademark grin, Phlox slurped some more jello and waited for an answer.

"No. She's not."

"Why are you here?" the Denobulan asked a more open-ended question.

Sobering, Malcolm shoved his plate away as he hesitated before answering. "I'm here to prevent something," he replied.

"I'm assuming Ensign Sato is some sort of key…a figurehead of a future event since the antidote is for her," Phlox surmised.

Malcolm bowed his head, appreciating the doctor's astute sense of discretion. "I need not tell you that what I'm about to disclose goes no further than this table."

Setting his fork down, the doctor nodded his head.

"In a few weeks, Captain Jonathan Archer will approach you and ask you to be chief medical officer on Enterprise. You accept the position," Malcolm paused.

Phlox started to say something, but Malcolm started talking again.

"I'm the armory officer on board and Ho – Ensign Sato is the communications officer."

Staring at the man across from him, Phlox waited for him to continue. "Is that it?"

"I've already told you more than I'm supposed to," Malcolm replied. "You've got to realize that you mustn't repeat any of this. You mustn't treat the ensign and I any differently than any of the other crew."

"I see," answered Phlox, spearing another piece of the dessert. "Does Ensign Sato know of your attempt to save her?"

"Yes."

"I'm no temporal theorist, but it sounds to me as though the damage has already been done," Phlox countered.

"There's more," Malcolm said.

Phlox cocked his head to one side. "Oh?"

"The other race I mentioned. They are still here…in this present. Once they realize the poison has been counteracted, they will try to kill her again," Malcolm explained. "I need you to…spy for me."

"I don't think I understand," the Denobulan puzzled.

Sliding a small tubular device across the table, Malcolm looked the doctor in the eye. "I can't influence my own 'timeline.' I need somebody to look after her for me. If she's in danger, signal me."

Phlox picked up the small device and examined it. "I look forward to meeting you soon, Mr. Reed."

--

"How is she?" a familiar voice asked through the haze in her head.

"She's still receiving hourly injections," another voice replied. "Dr. Proffitt assures me she will make a full recovery."

"And the doctor cleared her from decon?"

"With all due respect, Captain. I wouldn't have removed Ensign Sato from decon if it presented a danger to the ship." She heard a drip of sarcasm in the comment and opened her eyes.

"You gave us quite a scare, Hoshi," Archer said, smiling down at her.

Trying to sit up, Hoshi closed her eyes. The room was tilting and she just wanted it to stop.

"Although I admire your dedication…why did you come? I thought you were teaching. Trip has personally reassembled the UT to your specifications…" Archer's statement hung in the air.

What could she say to him? I just wanted to make sure the UT was installed properly before I kicked the bucket? It really is your armory officer's fault anyway. Luckily he managed to get the antidote to me in time. I wonder what kind of story he concocted.

Jon handed her some water. "Here. Sip this."

Sipping the water, she glanced at Malcolm. He looked haggard and angry. "Sir –" her voice cracked.

"You really should have given us some advance warning, Ensign."

Hoshi shuddered. She could tell this assignment was going to be a double-edged sword as Jon slipped into his captain voice. If it weren't for the opportunity to develop the UT, she never would have allowed him to talk her into joining Starfleet. Some friend he turned out to be.

"Firstly, you had the entire complex on alert. Your pilot didn't file a flight plan, much less think of the consequences of flying into restricted space. Secondly, you haven't been cleared by Starfleet medical," he added pointedly.

"I – I," she started.

"Once the CMO arrives, you will report to him for your physical," the captain admonished further. "Until then, you're restricted to your quarters. Is that understood?"

"Yes, sir," Hoshi replied quickly, wanting to smack the smirk off Lt. Malcolm Reed's face. Smarmy bastard! She glanced at Malcolm's hand, remembering the wound she had given him. God I hope it gets infected again!


	11. Chapter Ten

Chapter Ten –

"Personal Log, Hoshi Sato. May 7, 2151.

"I screamed like a girl. I could see that condescending look on his face – the one that is permanently worn around me. Excuse me for freaking out over dead aliens hanging around on meat hooks.

"I can't sleep. It's been almost a month since Mal – he brought me to Enterprise. My quarters are on the wrong side of the ship. I can hear every creak and moan of the ship. Everybody's still settling in, kind of shocked over the captain's decision to stay out here.

"On a more positive note, we're releasing Sluggo today. I'll miss him or her."

--

"July 3, 2151. Computer, resume recording.

"The UT is improving. Just today, I invaded T'Pol's privacy at a direct order from my captain. And I thought Lieutenant Reed was paranoid.

"Speaking of the annoyingly proper lieutenant – it looks as though he does relax enough to have fun some of the time. I never would have figured him to be a builder of snowmen, much less an artist. The ears on the snowman were inspired, but they were probably Travis' idea."

--

"Chief Medical Officer's Log, July 30, 2151.

I am in a quandary as to what to do about Ensign Sato. Mr. Reed left specific instructions that she was not to leave the ship without him. His instructions counteract his other directions. I'm not to interfere with either of them.

"I'm captivated by the ensign's natural proclivity to visit me. From my understanding, her arrival on board was auspicious as far as the elder Mr. Reed is concerned, but the present Lieutenant Reed has yet to warm up to her.

"Ensign Sato seems nervous around him, which makes me wonder what he told her. Mr. Reed didn't allude to Ensign Sato's 'timeline' being corrupted. But I can't help but reason as to why she is so nervous.

"Seeing as this is an official away mission, I've opted not to alarm Mr. Reed about it. After all, he is from the future and is probably well aware of the upcoming mission."

--

"Personal Log, September 4, 2151, Ensign Hoshi Sato.

"I've successfully alienated Lieutenant Reed for good. As I was trying to find out his favorite food, I propositioned him. At least that's what he thought. Arrogant jerk!

"I hate him! Why I ever kissed him back is beyond me.

"It's been six months…six months since I saw him.

"The waiting is…difficult.

"It's not like I can go up to him and ask him about the future. The lieutenant is clueless.

"When I was captured on Rigel X with Sub Commander T'Pol and Commander Tucker…" She shuddered, her voice trailing off.

"I can't help but feel I've got a guardian angel out there somewhere."

--

"Armory Officer's Log, October 7, 2151, Lt. Malcolm Reed.

"Ensign Sato's performance at target practice is lacking. She needs to relax."

--

"Personal Log, October 7, 2151, Ensign Hoshi Sato.

"Let's see. Where do I start?

"Damn, it's good to be alive! I love their language, but that Klingon ship was way beyond fragrant. The lieutenant doesn't realize how lucky he was, having a cold and all. I still wake up, the smells in my dream so vivid and nauseating.

"But! I'm making progress. At least I didn't scream like a girl in front of him.

"I think the worst part of the away mission was coming back – decon. There I was sitting in between an alien who is stacked and a man whose undergarments left little to the imagination.

"It's bad enough that my dreams are riddled with images of him. I'm tired of taking cold showers."

--

"Chief Medical Officer's Log, November 10, 2151.

"I'm getting the distinct impression that Mr. Reed will become one of my most frequent patients. To date he has been shot in the left leg, been treated for a cold, and is now recovering from hypothermia. In addition, he frequently stops by for his monthly allergy shots. Why the man insists on eating things he knows he's allergic to is beyond me.

"While Mr. Reed was recuperating from hypothermia, Ensign Sato stopped in. Although she primarily expressed concern for Commander Tucker's well-being, I couldn't help but notice her frequent glances toward Lieutenant Reed.

"It makes me wonder as to the nature of their future relationship. Naturally I would intercede in matters such as these, but I must heed Mr. Reed's warnings about not interfering."

--

"Chief Medical Officer's Log, December 24, 2151.

"Treated Lieutenant Reed for right shoulder wound. I wanted to keep him overnight for observation, but he said he was covering everybody's shift for the Christmas party."

--

"Armory Officer's Log, January 15, 2151.

"My brief stint as a Suliban has left a terrible rash. I will see if Phlox has any remedies. I need to get some sleep."

--

"Personal Log, January 25, 2151, Ensign Hoshi Sato.

"Doctor Phlox has expressed concern with my weight loss, and has taken up the habit of inviting himself to my meals.

"I admit I have lost a few pounds, but all the translations the captain has assigned is too much for the UT to handle.

"I think I corrupted the matrix when T'Pol and I cracked that creature's language. I'll have to restore the database to prior to the creature's arrival.

"T'Pol has invited me to her quarters for a quiet evening of meditation. I think I'll take her up on her offer, seeing as I could use the opportunity to distract my thoughts from Malcolm."

--

"Personal Log, February 17, 2152, Ensign Hoshi Sato.

"I did it! I drew a favorable lot for Risa! Two days of total immersion in paradise!

"I have it all planned out. I'll be staying in the same hotel as Malcolm, so technically he'll be there. There shouldn't be any problems. I've even promised myself that I won't stray from the hotel.

"Watch out, Risa! Here I come!"

TBC --


	12. Chapter Eleven

Chapter Eleven –

Frowning, Malcolm looked around the courtyard. She had to be here. Phlox had given him her room number. He had spent a fair amount of time trying to convince the Denobulan he could take care of Hoshi's vacation. The good doctor needed his hibernation time. She had followed his instructions to the letter, until now.

Familiar laughter floated up from the courtyard and Malcolm scanned the crowd.

There she was, dressed in a lavender outfit which hugged her curves invitingly. She was walking through the crowd, holding the hand of a man. What the hell did she think she was doing? Didn't she realize Suliban can shape-shift?

He heard her laugh again, their conversation in an alien language carrying up the stairs. Positioning himself at the top of the stairs, he waited for them to ascend.

She was half way up the stairs when she laughed again, stopping and turning around. It looked as though Hoshi were either kissing the man or whispering something in his ear. A spark of jealousy manifested inside him and it took all he could not to march down the stairs, punch the alien's lights out, and carry her away. She was playing a dangerous game, flirting on an alien planet.

The man's hands were on her back and traveling lower.

Malcolm took the stairs two at a time until he reached them, bumping into her. "I don't know what you think you're doing, Ensign, but you can say goodnight to your date," he growled, grabbing her round the waist and pulling her backwards and up the stairs.

"What?" was the only word that escaped her lips as she watched Ravis' startled eyes follow her. "Wait! I –"

"You are outside established parameters!" an angry voice informed her.

She stiffened, recognizing the husky older voice of her "savior."

Dragging her into a darkened corner, Malcolm covered her mouth with his hand. "I told you not to leave the ship," he snarled and gave her a little shake. "You stupid git!"

Having had enough of his tirade, Hoshi speared her heel into his foot.

He limped back, breaking his hold on her and cursing.

"Stupid git?" she fumed, pushing his shoulder. "Who the hell do you think you are?"

"I'm the bloody fool charged with protecting you," he mumbled under his breath.

"I haven't heard jack from you in almost a year," Hoshi muttered, realizing they were attracting a crowd. "How did you expect me to stay on the ship? I'm going crazy there!"

Looking around, Malcolm realized the attention they were drawing to themselves and grabbed Hoshi's hand. "Where's your room?"

Her eyes widened and she replied, "This way." With a look over her shoulder she saw the confused look on Ravis' face and waved goodbye to him.

No words were spoken as they made their way through corridors. Reaching her door, her hand trembled as she unlocked it.

Once the door was shut, he grabbed her by the shoulders and gave her a little shake. "So you're telling me that getting off with that guy is more important than your safety? You were practically shagging him on the stairs in front of everybody."

Hoshi's mouth dropped open, speechless.

Taking a calming breath, Malcolm released her shoulders. "Get your things," he stated softly. "You're going back to Enterprise."

Walking over to her bed, she sat down, and grabbed her alarm clock. "For your information, Ravis was helping me with the broken strap on my shoe. I was not shagging him in public. Secondly, I have a day left before the shuttle picks me up. I'm not leaving." She resisted the urge to throw the alarm clock at him, but quickly replaced it on her nightstand and crossed her hands on her lap, glaring at him.

He crossed the room, grabbed her bag and, started stuffing her clothes into it. "You're going back to Enterprise, Ensign," he stated with finality.

Hoshi picked up the alarm clock again and clutched it to her chest, as though daring him to take it from her. She stood up. "I've had two encounters with the Suliban," she stated calmly, referring to her encounter on Rigel X and Enterprise's time in the stellar nursery. "Has it ever occurred to you that I may no longer be on their list? I –"

"There have been no displacement rifts, Hoshi. They are still out there."

"Even if they are out there, I have followed your instructions," she replied cheekily. "Your room is down the hall. I'm sure by now you're pursuing the cosmopolitan lifestyle and banging some babe."

He rolled his eyes. If she only knew the truth of what happened to him on Risa, she would laugh. Refusing to rise to her taunt, he tossed her a communicator. "Contact Enterprise and tell them to send a shuttle."

Catching it, Hoshi quickly tossed it on the bed. The last year seemed like a long, drawn out nightmare, her being nervous over shadowy figures and the future. She was tired of it – tired of living in fear. "No," she whispered.

He made no move toward her, anger and frustration coursing through him. "It's a direct order, Ensign."

She resisted the urge to stick her tongue out at him. For the first she felt free, and she was going to be damned if he was going to take that from her. "Unless you plan on throwing me into the brig, I'm going downstairs to see if I can find Ravis. We're going to the Festival of the Moons, and – "

Malcolm crossed the room and pulled her into his arms, silencing her words as his lips crushed hers.

There was no pretense or subtext in the kiss, only blind, lustful need. Groaning, she deepened the kiss, granting the permission the man before her so desperately sought.

Feeling her yield, he tore her blouse from her body and kissed her exposed shoulder. He shuddered. "Hoshi…" his voice raw with hunger and lingering doubt.

She kissed his cheek. "Please," she whispered, reaching up and unhooking the front clasp of her bra.

Any doubt he had vanished, his mouth enclosing her breast and suckling.

She ran her hands through his hair and arched her back, groaning.

His hand slid past her skirt and panties, and she opened her legs willingly. His fingers caressed her folds.

As soon as he touched her femininity, he pulled away. Her world tilted and she felt the cool sheets touch her skin. She whimpered as he stood before her and disrobed. His eyes were a cloudy blue and the look he gave her was vacant and somber, as though he were pleading with her to make him stop.

She closed her eyes as the bed shifted and his body covered hers.

"Open your eyes," he whispered harshly, pushing into her slowly.

Hoshi's eyes widened and she gasped, her body quickly adjusting to him intimate invasion of her. Reaching up, she pulled him down for a kiss. She felt the end closing around her, yet managed to keep her eyes open as her world shattered.

His tormented eyes slammed shut as he spent himself inside her.

--

"She'll hate me when she discovers the truth," Malcolm thought to himself, staring out over the water, the waves mimicking his churning emotions. He was a selfish bastard, wanting her ever since he had met her. He couldn't stop himself, even waking her in the middle of the night to take her.

At one point he woke and she was on top of him. With a shift of his hips, he pressed into her and guilt stirred within him.

As much as he wanted to tell her he loved her… he never would. She would only hate him in the end.

He would have to find another way to prevent her abduction…another way to prevent her death. It was difficult to focus, his thoughts becoming more fractured the more time he spent in his past. Sleep was elusive and when he did sleep, his dreams were often nightmares – filled with images of Hoshi's death.

He had found one sliver of fiber tucked behind the one he was all too familiar with – the one he was trying to prevent. He thought he was imagining it, but he wasn't. The computer confirmed the alternate timeline. No details were known about it, but he held on to the hope that Hoshi was alive in it.

He knew now he would never rest until her fate twisted deep into the future…even if his didn't.

Grabbing the PADD, Malcolm stood up and walked into the room. He pulled his jacket on and reached out to touch her. She was safe now. He would watch over her from afar.

She turned her sleeping face toward his hand, smiling, and he pulled it back.

It was time to leave.

--

She fixed her eyes on the floor, unable to meet Malcolm's eyes. He had asked her a question, to which she gave a small reply, "Please excuse me, Lieutenant. I didn't sleep well on Risa."

She didn't see his eyebrow quirk.

"I told ya you would get used to Enterprise's sounds, Hoshi," Trip interjected, pulling the blanket around the shoulder. He frowned. Normally she would tease him how noisy the ship was, but she kept looking at the floor. "Hoshi, you okay?"

"Yes," she said, finally looking up and smiling. "I've never been better. Risa was beautiful."

Malcolm frowned when Hoshi bowed her head and concentrated on the floor again. "Are you sure, Ensign?"

Feeling the knife twist deeper in her heart, Hoshi smiled. It wasn't his fault he was clueless. "Never better," she replied with the brightest smile she could plaster on her face.

TBC --


	13. Chapter Twelve

Chapter Twelve –

"Personal log, March 20, 2152, Lt. Malcolm Reed.

"Doctor Phlox gave me a sedative an hour ago and I'm still unable to sleep. He says my injuries are superficial, and I agree with his assessment. He suggested I might be suffering from posttraumatic-stress disorder. I think he may be right.

"I've never felt so helpless in my life, locked up in my quarters. If Commander Tucker hadn't figured out a way to rig the com system and instigate the escape, or if Ensign Sato hadn't crawled through the vent system… Well, we might not be alive today.

"The commendation in my file is a moot one. I wouldn't have been able to do anything without them. Computer pause."

Standing up, he walked into the bathroom and looked at his reflection, his eye still swollen and purple, his lip swollen as well.

"Beep, beep," chimed his cabin door.

Without thought, he called out, "Enter," and was startled to see Hoshi standing in his doorway with a stack of freshly laundered clothes.

She stepped inside hesitantly. "I – I wanted to see how you were doing, sir."

"I'm fine," Malcolm replied, doing his best to smile but wincing as he felt his split lip sting.

Hoshi held out the clothes. "And to return all these," she added nervously. "Thank you."

Taking the clothes, he nodded.

She chuckled. "I kept wondering where the uniform with red piping came from. Then I remembered you loaned it to me when I came on board."

Malcolm nodded again, not really sure what to say next. She appeared tired and dull. Maybe her trek through the crawl space had been too much for her.

Hoshi turned to leave.

"Are you well, Ensign?"

Pausing, she turned around. How did she tell him she missed him? How did she tell him how furious she was with him for leaving her? How did she tell him she loved him? It was worse than a nightmare, being so close to him – him totally unaware of what he meant to her. "I'm fine, sir," she replied with a smile and walked out of his quarters.

--

"Chief Medical Officer's log, April 30, 2152.

"I'm happy to report that my sickbay is empty with one exception – Lieutenant Reed. Luckily the spike did not pass through the bone or any arteries. Although the pressure of the spike was sufficient to prevent any major blood loss, he will have mild anemia for the next few days, and has been instructed to rest. He scoffed at my instructions so I am keeping him sedated in sickbay.

"If I ever come across Mr. Reed again, I really must request some foreknowledge into any other injuries he may suffer while on board Enterprise.

"Ensign Sato's recovery is going slow. She still complains of headaches and insomnia even though I have found no medical explanation."

The sickbay doors hissed open and Phlox smiled as Hoshi walked in.

"Computer, pause log," Phlox stated.

"I'm sorry, Doctor," Hoshi murmured. "I didn't mean to interrupt anything. I'll just come ba –"

Grabbing her arm, Phlox steered her to a table. "Nonsense, Ensign."

She glanced over to the drawn curtains. "I'm having trouble sleeping," she announced with a yawn.

Phlox frowned and started running a scanner over her. She was showing obvious signs of stress. Maybe it was time for him to divulge the nature of his relationship with Mr. Reed. Perhaps it would help her if it were easier to talk to someone about it.

"H-how is Lieutenant Reed?" Hoshi asked quietly.

Drawing a curtain around the biobed, Phlox set the scanner on the bed. "The lieutenant is fine," he paused. "And how was he on Risa?"

Hoshi gave the Denobulan a guarded look. "I believe the lieutenant had a good time, but he hasn't really mentioned anything to me about it."

"That's odd. He said, and I quote, 'I'll toss her over my shoulder, and drag her kicking and screaming to the ship if I have to' when I contacted him regarding your lack of escort to Risa."

Surprise was clearly etched on her face, and she gasped, "You know!"

"Mr. Reed came to me for the antidote," Phlox confessed. "He asked me not to interfere in either of your timelines. However, I fail to see how me interfering in your timeline would make much difference, seeing as he already has – and has caused you great duress, I might add."

Relief washed over her, and a deluge of emotions overwhelmed her. Silent tears fell.

Handing her a tissue, the doctor continued. "I'm amazed Mr. Reed has survived to the age he seems to be," Phlox chuckled, trying to lighten Hoshi's mood.

Smiling through the tears, Hoshi sniffled. "You have no idea what it's like…constantly looking over my shoulder…jumping at every shadow that moves…having…him so close. We…we--" she paused, lowering her voice. "I love him," she finally admitted out loud.

Phlox nodded, already having arrived at that conclusion.

"It's difficult being around him…attracted to him…him not knowing –"

"Hoshi?" a groggy voice interrupted.

Motioning for Hoshi to be quiet, Phlox disappeared behind the curtain.

She held her breath and listened.

"Lieutenant Reed, how are you feeling?" she heard the Denobulan ask.

"I thought I heard Hoshi," Malcolm mumbled. "I had the strangest dream."

"Oh?" Phlox questioned.

"How is she?" Malcolm countered.

"She's fine."

"I'm right here, sir," Hoshi announced, pulling the curtain back.

Malcolm smiled, his eyes closing. A soft snore soon followed.

His hair was mussed and his smile faded.

"He'll be asleep off and on for the next few days," Phlox stated. "His stubbornness left me no other alternative."

--

"Personal log, July 17, 2152, Ensign Hoshi Sato.

"I shouldn't be surprised by the outcome, but I'm relieved Malcolm and Captain Archer were recovered without incident. I mean…obviously, Malcolm survived. He wouldn't be…involved in my life if he hadn't.

"It's been four months since Risa. It helps having somebody to talk to about…everything. Travis thinks I'm having an affair with Doctor Phlox," she giggled, tucking her foot under her leg and shifting position on her bunk.

"The spot on Commander Tucker's hand has reappeared, and – "

"Beep, beep," chimed the door.

Rolling off her bunk, Hoshi walked over to the door and opened it.

Lieutenant Reed stood before her, shifting nervously from foot to foot.

"Can I help you, sir?" she asked, motioning for him to enter her quarters.

Looking over his shoulder, Malcolm stepped inside enough to allow the door to close. "I just wanted to thank you."

"Sir?"

He tapped his PADD on his hand. "I was…um…reading over the mission briefing and if it weren't for you, the captain and I would be swinging at the end of their rope," he explained.

"Oh," she stated.

"I wanted to let you know that the captain…and I have both entered a commendation in your record."

"Th-thank you, sir," Hoshi stammered.

"I just wanted to let you know," Malcolm repeated, beating a hasty retreat.

--

"Armory Officer's log, September 20, 2152, Lt. Malcolm Reed.

"The armory is finally secured. The Takrets left quite a mess.

"In all honesty, inventorying the armory was nothing compared to our ordeal in the catwalk. Thankfully, Travis was able to pilot us out sooner than expected. I don't think I could have stood another day without a proper shower.

"I must admit. I did enjoy my time with the crew." He smiled. "Hoshi is an awful poker player," he stated, thinking of her lack of desserts during those last few hands, and pausing the log.

Stopping the computer from recording, Malcolm sighed and buried his face in his hands. Hoshi.

She was the only crewmember he didn't want to mention in his duty logs. For some peculiar reason, he just wasn't able to focus around her.

She was a natural, in skill and beauty. She had the ability to adapt to any circumstance – a quality he never would have thought she would have mastered. She had come a long way since they had met.

Malcolm ran a hand through his hair in frustration. He wasn't ready to admit the possibility he had feelings for her. Of course, he did. She was his friend.

__

Friends don't have overly erotic dreams about other friends, a little voice heckled him.

One dream, in particular, kept repeating. It was so real. His leave on Risa had been anything but memorable, but his dream about Risa was.

He had made love to her like a man possessed. They had fought, arguing about her being alone. She had mentioned another man and a streak of jealousy coursed through him. He had wanted her…always had.


	14. Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Thirteen –

Enterprise --

Her eyes slammed shut, Hoshi continued retching and clutching the sides of the toilet. "A million people are dead," the Captain's voice kept repeating in her head.

Was this why he had been sent back? Was she the reason all those people died?

The questions froze in his mind, a revelation exploding in a torrent of anger. He knew! That bastard knew about the attack!

There were no warnings! From what she had heard, the weapon had been swift, leaving nothing but a swath of charred devastation – a scar of death kilometers long.

She felt tainted – loving a man who could so callously allow all those people to die. How could he do it?

Two years! It had been two years since he had destroyed her life -- telling her he was there to save her. Did her presence on board Enterprise lead to this? It had been over a year since they had last argued -- a year of her longing for an absentee lover, convinced she was in love with him.

There was nothing left in her stomach to vomit, so she stood up and walked to the sink. With a shaky hand, she scooped some water and rinsed her mouth out.

The door to her quarters opened and she jumped as Phlox walked in.

"You didn't answer," he explained suddenly and started to relax as he realized she was fine. "Are you okay?"

Hoshi shook her head, buried her face in her hands and started to cry.

Putting a comforting arm around her shoulders, the doctor guided her to her bunk.

Between sniffles, she sobbed, "My fault…I just don't see…how I did this."

"What do you mean?" Phlox questioned softly.

"His mission. It failed. He was supposed to prevent me from coming here," she muttered between sobs. "I'm the catalyst. Did I say or do something wrong? Was the translation incorrect?" Her thoughts fractured as she contemplated her life over the last two years.

"You're speculating, Ensign," Phlox chastised, hearing the despair in her voice. "We don't know if this is the event."

"I –" she whispered.

"We may never know," he stated firmly.

--

Although familiar with death firsthand, he had never seen such desolation on such a scale. The trench was devoid of life, the twisted remnants of a town distinguishable here and there.

The guilt Malcolm felt over the attack caused him to pause.

Why he should feel guilty for dreaming of this was beyond him. It was strange…the nightmare that woke him for a mere second several nights ago…becoming a reality.

He felt as though he were split, his dreams taking on a separate and identifiable life of their own, most of them centering on Hoshi.

The Risa dream still repeated through his nightly sleep cycles, much to his frustration. The pattern was set – dream, cold shower, puttering in the armory until it was time for his duty shift.

It was torture, dreaming of her and waking with the memory of it. It was bloody ridiculous. He had to work with Hoshi. She was his friend.

--

In the Expanse –

Malcolm's hand shook as he set the autopilot of the Tellerite scout ship, his time in the past monitoring Hoshi's safety from afar, taking its toll on him. He had managed to rig his PADD to the main computer to find them.

All the computer had to go on were the Xindi logs – sensor ghosts of another Starfleet vessel in the Expanse. The distress beacon was set – his entire mission riding on fickle fate now.

Collapsing on a makeshift bunk, Malcolm shuddered and pulled his blanket around himself. The air in the cabin was livable, yet cold to conserve the power reserves on the stolen ship. He stared at the stars, knowing it was futile to fight the exhaustion that would eventually claim him.

He was entering the schism phase of temporal displacement disorder. If he survived it...well, he had to. He should welcome the dreams – the fractured bits and pieces of his life on Enterprise. At least he was near Hoshi in them.

His eyes drifted shut and he sighed, "Please forgive me."

__

There were too many unknown variables in the Expanse and it made him nervous. The addition of the MACO's made him even more nervous. This mission had him on edge.

His stomach growled, reminding him he had missed yet another meal so he made his way to the mess hall. Stepping through the doors, he stopped. Hoshi sat in a corner, tapping on a PADD, the look of concentration on her face bordering on frustrated.

"What's wrong, Hoshi?" Malcolm asked, the concern in his voice obvious.

She paid no attention to the use of her first name and continued concentrating on the PADD before her. "I can't do it," she mumbled. "There's not enough here."

Her inflection was frantic and desperate. He hadn't seen her like this since her first year on board Enterprise. "Hoshi?"

"I can't do it," she repeated, her voice hoarse. She set the PADD down on the table and rubbed the back of her neck.

"Do what, Hoshi?" he questioned softly, worried about her.

"There isn't enough here for an accurate translation!" she exclaimed. "I can't build a language on so few symbols. It's impossible."

__

Malcolm pulled the PADD away. "You were able to communicate with the creature that took Captain Archer and Commander Tucker hostage."

She glanced at him then, a look of disbelief on her face.

"When was the last time you got any sleep?"

Hoshi shook her head and shrugged her shoulders. "I can't remember."

Putting his hand on her arm, Malcolm suggested, "Why don't you go try to get some sleep?"

She shook her head again. "I can't. Captain Archer needs the base sequences for the UT as soon as possible."

"I'm sure six hours of sleep isn't going to delay your work, Hoshi."

__

"I still need to –"

"Get some sleep, Ensign," Malcolm interrupted. "That's an order."

Actuality clouded over as apparitions flitted through his mind, the madness making inroads into Malcolm's soul.


	15. Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fourteen –

"Are you sure?" a forceful voice asked.

"I'm positive," a soft-spoken voice replied.

"How did he get here?"

"Well, there's this Tellerite ship in the shuttlebay. I assumed it has similar propulsion technologies –"

"That's enough, Doctor," the forceful voice snapped.

"Well, you asked."

"I think your patient is awake."

Azure eyes fluttered open and stared up at the ceiling.

"Easy, Captain Reed. You're on Enterprise," stated the soft-spoken voice. "We found your ship in an anomaly field. We were unable to determine how long you were adrift, but you're making great progress."

Malcolm turned his head toward the voice. A young woman of obvious Denobulan ancestry stood beside his bed. He started to move, but found he couldn't. He was restrained.

Seeing the spark of panic flash in Reed's eyes, Doctor Nora Cole continued, "We had to restrain you when you came on board. You fought the orderlies and were delirious."

He barely recognized his own voice when he was able to form words. "What…day –"

"January 25, 2154," Nora replied, starting to undo the restraints.

"How did you get here, Captain Reed?" Lorian asked firmly.

Malcolm gazed past the doctor to the half human-half Vulcan captain of Enterprise. "You'll have to excuse my skepticism, Captain Reed, if that is who you really are. You're obviously not of this time. And the man I knew died almost seventy years ago."

"I'm…from the future," Malcolm announced cautiously.

"That's impossible," Lorian interjected decisively. "Temporal theory dictates matter would not survive through the gravitational –"

"It's just a theory," Malcolm replied softly. "Besides, you're talking about matter going forward, not backwards."

"Either way – "

"That's enough, Captain," Doctor Cole cautioned. "I won't have you badgering my patient."

Ignoring his CMO, Lorian continued questioning Malcolm. "Did the sphere builders send you?"

"That's enough, Captain!" The doctor warned, inserting her body between her captain and her patient. "Get out of my sickbay!"

Her face mere centimeters away from his startled him, and he backed away. "I need to ascertain the potential threat to –"

"Don't make me call Greer." The doctor's voice was low and threatening.

Lorian looked toward the sickbay doors where two security officers watched the heated exchange, their hands on their phase pistols unsure as to their course of action. "Stand down," he instructed, backing away from Nora.

Nora gave her captain a gentle push.

"Fine. Have it your way," Lorian growled, his emotions getting the better of him. He turned to the security detail. "As soon as he can walk, escort him to the brig."

--

Pacing the short length of the brig, Malcolm ran a hand through his hair. He knew better than to attempt an escape. After all, he had helped design the brig. He still had time – time to alter the outcome of Hoshi's future – his future.

The outer door opened. Malcolm stopped pacing and glanced at Lorian. Lorian's expression was anything but welcoming.

Holding up the PADD Malcolm had jury-rigged to the Tellarite ship, Lorian asked, "We've tried activating the database, but it turns off every time we try."

Malcolm turned around, leaned against the glass, and crossed his arms.

"It'd be a shame to ruin Doctor Cole's dedicated work," threatened Lorian pointedly.

Turning around, Malcolm smirked, "I'll only talk to your mother."

"Why?"

"You're too emotional to think logically about the possibilities I present," Malcolm countered.

Lorian's eyes flashed in anger. "You'll have to excuse me if I have a difficult time believing that a man who has been dead since I was a little boy suddenly returns unannounced. This is an obvious attempt by the sphere builders to undermine our attempts to find Enterprise."

"You'll find Enterprise," Malcolm stated solemnly, remembering T'Pol's theory as to what happened to the other Enterprise once they had come out of the vortex. Her theory had been spot on. The grandfather paradox was instantaneous and this Enterprise had ceased to exist. They existed only in a rare spatial phenomenon called a loop.

They had waited for Lorian to come out of the rift. They had waited longer than they should have. Once T'Pol's theory circulated, a subtle mourning period overcame the crew.

He had found Hoshi staring aimlessly out a window on the observation deck, debris still hanging from the bulkhead. It had been her favorite spot, her picture window she had called it.

Her tears had fallen unabashedly as she cried for the children she would never have.

"You'll find them and tell them not to take Enterprise through the sub-space corridor, offering them alien propulsion schematics to modify the injector assembly," Malcolm said, stumbling over the last bit as he remembered the first meeting between Lorian and Captain Archer.

The shocked look on Lorian's face told Malcolm he had remembered it correctly. Then it occurred to him – they had the same mission, and Lorian should have been able to find Enterprise as it entered the Expanse. A sudden anger suffused its way through him and he punched the glass. "You had access to crew logs. How can you stand there and tell me you can't find Enterprise? Do you realize how many crew died during the attack at Azati Prime?"

"Over sixty percent of the logs were lost during a confrontation with the Corinals," Lorian replied softly. "Being from the future, you should have known that."

"Being from the future doesn't make me omnipotent," Malcolm spat.

Lorain backed away with a smirk on his face. "It looks as though I'm not the only one with emotional problems."

The door hissed open and both men stared at the opening, waiting for whoever it was to enter. Finally a frail, elderly T'Pol entered, her shrewd eyes going from her son to the man behind the glass.

She eyed Malcolm wearily, then addressed her son. "Dr. Cole was worried about her patient. You should have told me we had a visitor."

Somehow he managed to rein in his anger. Nora always did have the annoying trait of running to his mother when she disagreed with one of his decisions. "He's not a guest, mother. He's a prisoner."

"Unlock it," T'Pol instructed, ignoring Lorian's obvious distress.

When Lorian's Enterprise found Archer's, Malcolm never had the chance to meet with T'Pol. He watched openly as her decrepit form creeped closer to the brig's inner door.

"No," Lorian stated softly.

Crossing her arms over her chest in an un-Vulcan-like manner of irritability, she frowned. "Nora was right about you. You've become increasingly erratic ever since our first mission failed. Has Nora not confirmed his genetic profile?"

Lorian nodded.

"Yet you still believe this is some elaborate plot –"

"Your own theories dictate time travel to be impossible –"

"The Vulcan Science Directorate dictates time travel to be impossible," T'Pol corrected. "I've always thought it was improbable, yet here we are."

"I'll tell you anything you want to know," Malcolm interjected, staring at the woman who had been the first officer during his time on the Enterprise.

Realizing arguing with his mother was pointless, Lorian handed her the PADD. "See if you can get this to work."

T'Pol took the PADD and watched him walk out, worried for him, then turned her gaze to Malcolm. "Your mission has failed, Captain Reed. I've been instructed to inform you to return to your thread."

He stared at her, not really sure if her heard her correctly. He wasn't sure of anything anymore.

T'Pol turned the PADD in her hand and activated it, walking to the glass door and releasing the locking mechanism. "You are to return to these spatial coordinates and await further instructions."

Panic coursed through him as T'Pol's words repeated in his mind. Her ease accessing the temporal device made him seethe as betrayal loomed before him. She was obviously a sleeper agent.

"I trust your temporal displacement disorder has not rendered your detail to duty obsolete," T'Pol stated flatly and held the PADD out to him, her hand trembling with the effort.

Taking the PADD, Malcolm glanced at the coordinates and the orders. "I don't take orders from Daniels."

"You always did have a problem following orders," she huffed. "That's why the Suliban were sent after her."

Shocked, ice-blue eyes bored into her serene ones as realization dawned on him. Daniels had authorized the Suliban assassination attempt. "I'll kill him when I see him next."

T'Pol crept closer to him. "Before you declare revenge on Daniels, know this – I gave the order for the Suliban to assassinate Hoshi."

Fury raced through him and he clenched his fist. "Why?" Malcolm asked, feeling acid churn in his stomach.

"Jonathan's logic was flawed. You were too emotionally involved to carry out this mission," T'Pol reasoned. "Do you deny you love Hoshi?"

Malcolm said nothing, the betrayal slicing into his soul.

T'Pol smirked. "On this thread, Hoshi bore you two children after you died. Even in this reality, you never admitted how you felt about her. She knew though, petitioning Phlox to harvest your DNA so that she could have a piece of you."

"How could you order her death?" Malcolm's voice was filled with unrestrained anger.

"The Suliban were to poison Hoshi, making it appear she had died of natural causes. You had the UT, which you were supposed to place somewhere Starfleet could find it, yet you never did. Once her loved ones mourned her, Hoshi was to be brought into the future – to a theoretical, alternate thread – one where the Xindi attack never occurred."

Her words imbedded themselves inside him – the possibility of her strategy rendering a credibility he had never considered… a world where Hoshi would never know him…never know the pain she had suffered along with the rest of Enterprise's crew. The possibilities were overwhelming. "What happened?"

"Our mission failed. So did yours, along with the Suliban mission. The cascade effect has narrowed the cataclysmic window of opportunity to an unacceptable margin. You are to return to your thread." T'Pol placed a hand on the glass and leaned against it, the effort of her speech draining her.

Grabbing her arm, Malcolm helped her to the cot. "You've got to help me, T'Pol. In three weeks, you'll find Enterprise. I can use that time to talk to Hoshi, maybe convince her not to go with Captain Archer to the Xindi Council. If they never see her, they won't know about her ability."

T'Pol shook her head no. "It's too risky," she coughed.

"I'll abduct her if I have to," Malcolm concluded, his voice rasped.

The Vulcan held her hand out, motioning for his PADD.

Handing it to her, Malcolm paced and let the insanity carry him away. "We'll find a thread. She'll adjust," he reasoned, a sliver of his rationality knowing Hoshi would succumb to the temporal diseases which claimed so many who cheated fate.

"Here," T'Pol's voice called out softly. "This is the only viable alternative. It's risky, but you may be able to change the outcome…Hoshi's and the future's."

Kneeling in front of her, Malcolm took the PADD from her and started scanning it desperately. He immediately shook his head. "It's too risky."

"It's the only viable alternative," T'Pol repeated.

"I can't put her through that," he argued, his voice a low whisper.

"She'll never agree to what you propose. The damage has been done. There are events in place that cannot be stopped."

"This," Malcolm challenged. "This wouldn't work!"

"It's the logical choice, Captain, as it renders the highest success rate." T'Pol stood up. "Don't let your personal feelings cloud your judgment. This is the original thread. We can change it. Did you ever weigh the catalyst against the event? Even if the Reptillians don't abduct her and force her to decipher the Aquatic code, they will find another way. If we use her –"

"I won't use her as bait!" he yelled, arguing more with the logic of what T'Pol was proposing than with T'Pol herself.

"If we use her," T'Pol repeated, undeterred. "She may be able to disable the Xindi weapon from the inside."

Malcolm starred at the floor.

"There is even a possibility she could be retrieved," she stated firmly.

He shuddered as he contemplated her words. It wasn't just about Hoshi anymore.


	16. Chapter Fifteen

A/N -- Thanks to Stormienight, Exploded Pen and Celine for the kind review.

Chapter Fifteen –

She stared at the bulkhead where her window used to be, apathy no longer a stranger to her. Some of her personal belongings were strewn about her cabin, others had been blown out into the vacuum of space. A support beam covered her bunk and she scoffed, "I wonder if it fell before the window blew out."

Climbing over the beam, Hoshi stumbled into her bathroom and reached for a towel. It was gone…probably blown out into space. The water to C deck had been turned off. Why she had bothered coming to her cabin for a quick shower?

Picking up a chair, she brushed it off. There was nothing – no dust or debris to brush off. At least she wouldn't have to dust this month. Sighing heavily, Hoshi rested her arms on her thighs and bowed her head, a spark of guilt wavering steadily inside her.

A fate worse than death – this is what this is. She knew something bad was going to happen. Was this it? Was the Xindi attack it? Was there something else? She shuddered, momentarily losing the focal point that kept her sane – her duty. The doctor, her only confidant, reminded her daily that she wasn't responsible for the faceless millions who perished in the first Xindi attack.

Now others were dead – people she knew – her crewmates. At least the captain had made it back alive.

"Ensign?"

Hoshi righted herself quickly and wiped her hands on her coveralls. "Yes?"

Pushing his way into her quarters, Malcolm frowned. "What are you doing here?"

She lied, not wanting to sound vain in her attempt to grab a quick shower. "I was just seeing if there was anything I could salvage."

Cold, black eyes stared at him, a ghost of a smile playing across her lips as she tried to make light of a bad situation. Everybody had the same stare – the stare of vacancy and exhaustion. "You can't be in here, Hoshi," Malcolm stated softly. "It's not safe."

"You're here," she replied pointedly.

"You tripped the security sensors. The engineering crews won't get to the crew quarters until tomorrow. It's not safe," he repeated.

Hoshi shook her head as if she were waking up. "You're right, Lieutenant. I guess I should grab a uniform and report to the lounge on B deck. That's where the temporary quarters are, right?"

Grabbing one of her uniforms from the closet, Malcolm motioned for her to follow him. "Until the area is repaired, you shouldn't be here. Is that understood, Ensign?"

She nodded and followed him into the corridor into the turbo lift. Before she knew it, she was on B deck, Malcolm's hand at her back, guiding her along the corridor.

"You can rest in my quarters," he said simply.

Stopping dead in her tracks, Hoshi answered, "No."

Malcolm punched in his code, and the door to his cabin opened. "You aren't due on duty for another six hours. You should take the time to shower and get some rest. Commander Tucker has requested my assistance with the Illyrian warp coil." He hung her uniform in the closet and brushed past her.

She would have continued arguing with him, but he pulled her into his cabin and left.

Looking around the sparsely decorated cabin, Hoshi frowned. There were hardly any identifying items in the cabin which showed he lived here…other than the subtle scent that was uniquely his.

Hoshi closed her eyes and inhaled, memories of Malcolm pervading her thoughts. She wanted to hate him, but couldn't. She just had to keep reminding herself that Lieutenant Reed was not responsible for his…future self, and she treated him with an exacting degree of professionalism.

His offer was out of the question. She couldn't stay here. Grabbing her uniform from the closet, she left.

--

Although he had been given clearance to roam the ship freely, Malcolm kept to his cabin. Darkness surrounded him, as there were no windows in his temporary quarters. The dark reflected his thoughts, a never-ending quagmire of temporal threads and linear notions. Past and present merged with the future as continued exposure to the past manifested itself into the third stage of the temporal displacement disorder.

T'Pol had tried her best to convince him to leave now while he still had a tenuous grasp on his sanity. He stopped sleeping several nights ago, the disjointed dreams of his present self encroaching nightly. The temporal displacement disorder would soon impede his waking hours as well.

He'd been displaced for three years now, his obsession over saving Hoshi outweighing any logic he may have alluded to having when he had first traveled back to the past. For two years, he had lived with the guilt of misleading her…the guilt of seven million people dying.

Whether it was dumb luck or poor judgement that had led him to his current situation, he did not know. T'Pol's declaration had stirred a heady guilt and a simmering anger inside him. She was responsible for the failure of his mission. If it hadn't been for her interference, Hoshi would be happily teaching in Brazil.

Damn her Vulcan logic! It was her logic that had determined he was too emotionally involved with the catalyst to bring about a successful outcome. He would never know if that was so, for it was the arrival of the Suliban that forced him to act the way he had. If only they had waited. If only they had given him the chance to change her mind.

The chirp on his door broke his reverie and he reached above him to turn on a lamp. "Enter."

"Captain Reed?"

Malcolm cringed as Doctor Cole flipped a switch and flooded the room with more light.

"I thought perhaps we could go over your plan one more time," Nora stated curiously.

"There isn't much to it," Malcolm replied gruffly. "I'll talk to Hoshi and you can tag her. You won't have to worry about your ethical dilemma. I know her. She won't refuse."

"As long as you're sure," the doctor said.

"I am." The only thing he was sure of was Hoshi reaction. She would do it and he would deliver her to the Reptilians.

The doctor paused. "I'm more concerned with your condition, Captain. From what I was able to ascertain from your medical subroutines on your PADD, you're entering the third stage of the displacement disorder. I'm able to treat your physical symptoms. I'm afraid the only way you'll…" Nora struggled with the words she had little practice telling someone their condition was terminal.

"Get better?" Malcolm provided for her, seeing her struggle with the words.

Nora nodded and cleared the lump in her throat. "The sooner you…travel to your own time, the better your chances for recovery."

Malcolm smiled, a brief moment of comprehensibility surfacing in his mind. "I'm not leaving until I can talk with her again."

"I understand that, sir. Perhaps it would be better if one of us – "

He charged her, pinning her against the wall, his arm across her throat. "Don't touch her! Don't you dare go near her!"

Wide, azure eyes and silent gaps for breath pleaded for him to release her.

Long, sharp nails dug into his arm, braking his skin, drawing blood and pulling him out of the madness.

Stumbling backwards, Malcolm fell to his knees and started to moan. "Leave her alone. I'm so…sorry."

Nora clutched her sides and backed away from him, her nurturing side unable to overcome her instinct to flee.


	17. Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Sixteen

Stepping into her newly restored quarters, Hoshi sighed. She was one of the fortunate few who had a working shower, and she could no longer ignore the lure of the simple luxury. The events over the last six hours were quickly forgotten as she started peeling the jumpsuit from her body.

They had survived, at least Enterprise had. If what their "descendants" said were true, then the crew would pair off and have children of their own. It was unnerving to say the least. Like everyone else, she had peeked into her future and had seen she had two children. She stopped, not wanting to know who the father was, but envisioning her son and her daughter with Malcolm's eyes. Yet her brief encounter with Malcolm Reed, time traveler extraodinaire, had shown her that nothing was ever set in stone.

Hoshi kicked off her boots, and stepped out of her uniform and into the shower. Turning the knob, she made no attempt to back away from the cold water. A sound caught her attention, but she dismissed it, her greed to get clean overriding sense of caution.

He wanted to turn away, but the sight of her stirred memories of desire he had tried denying since their conversation in the bar. Stepping into the shadows, Malcolm watched and waited, feeling the immediate curiosity of his present self as he noticed the small energy spike inside Hoshi's quarters. Even though the transporter signal was masked, it wasn't totally undetectable.

Maybe this was a mistake. Maybe he shouldn't have come. He closed his eyes as a vision of his console appeared in his mind. It was like being in two places at one time. The problem was that just as he felt his thoughts and pictures of what he was doing now, his

present self was surely feeling and seeing what he was doing as well.

The water clicked off and he shrank back into the shadow of her cabin.

"Damn," she cursed and padded out of the bathroom, dripping wet without a towel. She opened her closet and pulled two towels out, quickly wrapping her hair in one and the other around her body.

The sight of her glistening, naked form stirred him and he gasped.

Hoshi turned, clutching the towel to her chest.

He stepped out of the shadows, paying close attention to the emotions that played across her face.

Shock turned to apprehension as she approached him thoughtfully as though she was afraid he would disappear in front of him.

"Are you a dream?" she whispered, reaching out to touch him.

Malcolm should have stopped her from touching him, but he was weak and wanted to feel her flesh against his.

Tracing her hand over his face and running her fingertips over the aged lines of his face, Hoshi stared at him. Shock turned to reason, which was quickly turning into anger. He had manipulated and lied to her.

She slapped him not once, but repeatedly, cursing him.

"How could you?" she asked, her hand connecting with his reddened cheek. "Seven million people!"

Malcolm lost count of how many times she slapped him, but she was only getting louder and he was getting worried she would attract unwanted attention. So he grabbed her wrists and pulled her into his arms, placing his hand over her mouth. "Be quiet," he pleaded gently. "We need you."

Hoshi's eyes misted as the illusion of normalcy crashed in around her. It wasn't over, he had inferred. There was something worse out there something she was responsible for. She swallowed the panic in her throat and nodded for him to let her go. As he let her go, she grabbed the towel and held it to her chest. "Why?"

The question hung in the air.

"Why didn't you just let them kill me?"

"I-- I "

"Why didn't you stop the first attack? What's going to happen?"

"Perhaps you should get dressed first," Malcolm suggested, his eyes lingering on her scarcely covered body.

Watching him closely, she dressed in front of him, pulling her underwear on underneath her towel then pulling a baggy T-shirt over her head, and then pulling the towel from under her shirt. Her eyes never left him, afraid he would disappear if she blinked.

Clearing his throat, Malcolm started answering her questions. "Have you ever heard of a grandfather paradox?"

Hoshi shook her head.

Malcolm sighed. "Imagine your grandfather. Now, imagine going back in time and killing him. If you killed him, your father or mother would never have been born. You would not be born either. Essentially, you didn't exist to go back in time to kill your grandfather. So it never happened. Now, imagine somebody else killed your grandfather. They not only killed your grandfather. They killed your father or mother, and you and any children you may have."

Hoshi nodded for him to continue.

"Multiply that by seven million, and "

"But you knew the attack was going to happen!"

His temper flared and he glared at her. "And just what would you have had me do? Take an advertisement out, or run up and down the street like a nutter?"

She was shocked into silence as his harsh words reverberated through the room. The man before her was not the same man she knew. He wasn't the same man whom she had met in the bar. The subtle changes in his demeanor frightened her as she saw the slight maniacal glint in his eye.

"It's too late," he muttered, starting to pace. "The paradoxical wave washed over the future my future. We won't survive another temporal incursion. There would be no chance of recovery. It would wipe humanity clean and --"

"What is it, Malcolm?" she asked delicately.

He stopped pacing, distracted by the muddled thoughts of his present self. Swearing he would never tell her of her role on his thread, he acquiesced. "I need you, Hoshi," he murmured.

She shied away from his touch. "Don't touch me."

Malcolm collapsed on his knees in front of her. "The Reptilians will abduct you and force you to decrypt a disarming code for the weapon. They'll destroy Earth."

Sinking to the floor next to him, Hoshi shook her head, not really comprehending what she had heard.

Awareness fractured through Malcolm and he grabbed her shoulders and shook her. "You've got to focus, Hoshi. Because I can't," he labored to say as he felt his present self dispatching a security team to her quarters.

Hoshi tried pulling away from him, refusing to listen.

"Events are in place. They can't be stopped," his voice rasped and tears formed in his eyes. "We have a plan, but it's risky."

He wasn't making any sense and she tried to get away from him, but she found herself wrestling with him and losing the battle. "Please," she pleaded. "Let me go."

He straddled her hips and pinned her arms above her head. "Promise me that you'll forgive me no matter what happens."

"You're scaring me," she cried.

"You've got to come with me. They're coming"

Hoshi continued to struggle, whimpering.

Flipping the communicator open, Malcolm said, "We're ready. Energize."

She screamed as she felt familiar pull of a transporter beam.


	18. Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Seventeen –

"Sir, Ensign Sato isn't in her quarters. Her communicator is right here," Ensign Mathers spoke into the comm panel evenly.

"I'll be right there," came the stern reply.

Leaning over his console on the bridge, Malcolm let the wave of nausea pass over him. It was as though he had been sleepwalking as flashes of Hoshi crying passed before him, his feelings of hopelessness and desperation tearing him apart. She was gone now. They had taken her.

--

His dead weight on top of her, Hoshi grunted as she pushed against him unable to see where they had transported.

"Help me get him off of her," a panicked voice called out.

No sooner had the words been spoken then Malcolm was lifted from her.

"He's in shock!" Doctor Cole announced loudly, prepping a table. "Bring him over here."

Hoshi stood and watched as Malcolm's limp body twitched and writhed as it was placed on an exam table.

"Can he be stabilized?" a soft, unsteady voice questioned.

She turned to see an aged T'Pol limping toward the exam table, concern tempering her inflection and marring her elderly features.

"I'll see what I can do," the doctor replied sharply.

"Nora," T'Pol pleaded shakily. "You've got to stabilize him. Otherwise, he won't make it back."

Hoshi watched as the doctor injected numerous hyposprays into Malcolm's neck. "I'm doing what I can. He must have seen himself. The onset of stage four is never this sudden. Help me tie him down."

A man with blonde hair held Malcolm down as the doctor strapped him down.

T'Pol glanced at Hoshi as though surprised the communications officer was there. "What happened? Was there a confrontation with Lieutenant Reed?"

Hoshi shook her head. "N—no."

"Tag her and beam her back before she's missed," T'Pol ordered quickly.

"I'm a little busy," Nora snapped back, monitoring the man gasping for breath on the table before her.

"T-tag me?" Hoshi asked, backing away slowly.

T'Pol looked at her again, noticing her defensive posture…Hoshi's arms crossed in front of her and her efforts to back away. Malcolm had probably fallen before he could tell her the plan. "What did he tell you?"

Backing into another exam table, Hoshi stopped. "I—I'm responsible," she whispered. "For the destruction of Earth."

"On one thread, yes," T'Pol agreed, grabbing a hypospray off the table and advancing toward Hoshi. "But you have the opportunity to correct it, Hoshi."

"How?" she asked quickly.

"We can use you…tag you. If they take you and you're tagged, they can find you," the Vulcan explained quickly. "It'll change everything…over ninety-six percent of the future threads."

"He's coming out of it," Nora announced, a note of triumph in her voice.

"Hoshi," he whispered her name reverently. "You don't have to."

An air of finality hung in the air…as though the presence of the Grim Reaper had come to take a life. She could hear the desperate tone in his voice and approached Malcolm.

"There's nothing else I can do," Doctor Cole announced more to herself than the other people in the room. "Unless he returns to the future, he'll die."

Malcolm quivered. "I won't use you as bait, Hoshi. Love you too much to put you through that."

Hoshi grabbed his hand which was seeking hers blindly. His eyes were glazed and searching for her, unable to see anything. "I'm here, Malcolm," she called to him, her voice steady yet soothing.

"I – I can't see you," he gave a whispered groan as the desperate search for her onboard Enterprise intensified.

The tactical alert was upgraded. Security teams were sweeping deck to deck, looking for her.

Stroking his hand, Hoshi felt the bitter tears rise in her throat. "I'm here, Malcolm."

"Come with me," he begged softly. "You won't have to do this. I'll protect you. I'll –" His plea was lost as he started mumbling incoherently.

"What's wrong with him?" Hoshi questioned.

"He's been displaced for too long," T'Pol explained quickly, not realizing Hoshi was unfamiliar with the term.

Nora grabbed Malcolm's PADD and laid it on his chest. "You've got to go back, Captain Reed. There's no time to waste."

"Can't you just send him back?"

"Only he can activate the temporal mechanics," T'Pol addressed Hoshi's question.

Hoshi put up her hands in confusion.

Nora injected a hypospray into Malcolm's neck and turned toward Hoshi. "He's obsessed with saving you. He won't survive much longer. He's in the final stage of temporal displacement disorder. Living matter cannot exist on the same thread at the same time. If Captain Reed had come into contact with his present self, he would have died instantly. He has to go back to the future if he is to recover."

"You're the catalyst, Hoshi. You have the potential to destroy…Your ability has been used to destroy the Earth. The temporal threads are flooded with the destruction of Earth. Most notable of all future events that changed is the formation of the Federation. It will never happen." T'Pol shuffled her feet as she approached Hoshi. "My own planet will become mired in a civil war."

Hoshi remained silent.

"The event is nearing. Your role in coming events is necessary to build the trust of the Xindi/Human coalition. The Reptilians will capture you and you will decipher the Aquatics' security code. The subspace vortex will shield the weapon from detection. The coalition's inability to find the probe will lead to the destruction of Earth and the Lunar colonies. If we had a way to track the probe in the corridor, perhaps – "

"Knowing they will kidnap me, you'll tag me?"

T'Pol nodded.

"How do you know it will work?"

"It's a temporal tag. It works on a temporal plane which doesn't adhere to the physicality of the subspace vortex. It'll work. It's what the coalition will need to stop the weapon."

"What do I need to do?"

T'Pol looked from Hoshi to Nora, who handed a hypospray to T'Pol. "You do nothing. The less you know, the more likely you will follow the natural progression of – "

"Natural?" Hoshi scoffed softly, grabbing the hypospray and injecting it quickly into her neck.

T'Pol was about to say something but Malcolm became lucid again.

Shivering, Malcolm pulled against his restraints. "Hoshi?"

"I'm here, Malcolm," she replied and grabbed his hand.

"Come with me. You'll be safe."

Hoshi held the PADD and loosened the restraint on one of his hands. He had to leave. It was the only way to save him. "Yes, Malcolm," she whispered steadily, trying to keep the deceit out of her voice. "Take me with you." She leaned over him and kissed him gently on his lips.

"You'll die if you go with him," T'Pol stated quickly. "Just like he's dying now, out of his own time."

Hoshi held a hand up in understanding, giving the Vulcan a sad look. "I know what I have to do, Sub-Commander."

"You forgive me?" the last of his reason questioned, his fingers slowly tapping on the PADD.

"I love you," Hoshi replied softly, hoping it wasn't the last time she got to tell him.

His hand clasped hers and he smiled.

Nora watched as Hoshi placated the dying man. She waited as he entered the final sequence, listening for the telltale signs of a temporal shift. Hoshi pulled away from Malcolm as he started to dissolve in front of them. A tortured cry echoed through the room as he realized Hoshi's treachery.

Looking at the indentation where Malcolm had been, Hoshi closed her eyes.

"Hoshi?" T'Pol's voice was soft as a warm hand touched her shoulder. "They're looking for you. You've got to go back now."

She ran her hand over the indentation and nodded, ready to face the fate that awaited her. "Send me back."

--

Startled cerulean eyes stared at her as she materialized in front of Malcolm in her quarters. "What the bloody hell is going on?"

Hoshi stared at him, disoriented momentarily at seeing the younger version of the man she had fallen in love with. She had to think fast. She couldn't let him know what was going to happen.

Malcolm flipped his communicator open and barked out a command. "Lieutenant Reed to the bridge."

"Go ahead, Lieutenant Reed," T'Pol's voice replied.

"Ensign Sato was just beamed to her quarters. Recommend going on tactical alert."

"Understood."

Malcolm grabbed Hoshi by the shoulders and shook her gently. "Are you okay, Hoshi? Where have you been? What did they want?"

Hoshi tried pulling away from him, but he held onto her firmly.

"I know something's wrong Hoshi. I – I could feel it," he continued, trying to get her to look him in the eye. "You were scared. I don't know how, but I was here. What happened?"

She knew better than to mislead him. The temporal displacement disorder had obviously affected him as well. "I'm fine, Malcolm – sir."

His hands roamed over her body in a clinical way as if ascertaining through touch that she was indeed fine and in front of him. "Where were you?"

"I was onboard the other Enterprise," she replied calmly as though trying to pacify a child.

"What did they want?" His hold on her tightened.

Hoshi tried wiggling out of his grasp, but gave up. "That's my business, sir."

"Not when it comes to the safety of this ship, Ensign."

Hoshi looked nervously at him. She had to come up with a believable lie. "I – I received a message…from T'Pol."

Malcolm tensed, but released her.

"It's personal," Hoshi hedged.

"So personal T'Pol couldn't go through the proper channels?"

Hoshi cleared her throat and looked down.

Malcolm grabbed her again, forcing her to look at him. "Tell me I'm not crazy, Hoshi. I was on the bridge and I had flashes of you in your quarters. You were taking a shower. We argued. You said I was scaring you."

Cinnamon eyes stared into blue. "I don't know what you are referring to, sir."

The blatant lie hung in the air and he backed away slowly as he realized she wasn't going to volunteer anything. If she hadn't transported into her cabin in front of him, he would have thought he was losing it, but something was definitely up. He looked at her shrewdly, remembering bits and pieces of the panic he felt. Hoshi was in danger. He knew that much.


	19. Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Eighteen –

"You're in danger," Malcolm stated slowly, trying to reach Hoshi on some other level as she stood before him with her arms crossed stubbornly over her chest.

"We all are," Hoshi retorted quickly, wanting to help him sort through the confusion yet knowing she shouldn't. There was too much riding on her. She would have to face the Reptilians on her own.

Years of knowing her…years of fantasizing about her…of dreaming of her boiled over. His better judgment abandoned him and Malcolm cursed – who or what he didn't know. For years he had wanted her. But now, he needed her. "Hoshi –"

Seeing him struggle, Hoshi placed a finger over his lips. "Trust me, Malcolm. Believe in me. It was a personal matter T'Pol needed to speak to me about." Part of the truth was better than none.

A strangled noise of want was the only sound Malcolm made and he took her hand in his, kissing her palm.

Standing on her toes, Hoshi leaned into him suggestively, pressing her lips against his softly. If she died tomorrow, she would die loved.

His eyes wide open, Malcolm returned the kiss hesitantly at first, momentarily forgetting his duty. Unable to deny the feelings any longer, his lips crushed hers.

Hoshi moaned as he grasped her buttocks and pulled her against his hardened arousal. Instinctively, she reached for his zipper. Breaking the kiss, she felt him hesitate, the last vestiges of resistance quickly giving way. "Please, Malcolm. I need you."

His communicator chirped, bringing reality crashing around them. Pushing her away, Malcolm flipped the communicator open. "Reed here."

The captain's voice sounded over it. "Malcolm. Why was the tactical alert upgraded?"

Malcolm's eyes narrowed as he looked at Hoshi. For now he would have to trust her. "Stand down, sir. The situation has been resolved."

She could hear the curiosity and weariness in the captain's voice, but also the inferred and trusted understanding. "Has the situation been resolved?"

"Yes, sir. Ensign Sato has been located."

There was a slight pause, then the captain replied, "Very well then. Archer out."

Malcolm clicked the communicator shut and glanced at Hoshi, quickly looking away, noticing her swollen lips and mussed hair. Clearing his throat, he backed away from her, needing to speak to the captain. "I – I apologize, Ensign."

He left before she could reply.

--

He hadn't slept in thirty-six hours and he was punchy. They had made it through the subspace corridor even after Lorian's crew had attempted to steal the injectors. How was Hoshi involved? Was she involved? He needed to know. He wanted to trust her.

They were on their way to rendezvous with Degra and there was too much at risk with the council meeting days away.

Pressing the chime, he stepped back.

The door opened and Hoshi stood to the side to allow him entry. She said nothing.

Waiting for the door to close behind him, Malcolm realized what a mistake this was.

Sighing, Hoshi leaned against the wall. "I supposed you came by to ask me if I knew anything about Lorian's attempt to steal the injectors."

With each question, he edged closer to her.

"Yes," he replied softly.

"No," Hoshi stated.

Malcolm stared at her, waiting for more of an explanation. There were too many questions and not enough answers…especially when it came to Hoshi. It was time for some answers. "So you mean to tell me that you were transported to the other Enterprise to discuss the weather? If T'Pol wanted to discuss a personal matter with you, why didn't she just send you a personal note? Why the subterfuge?"

"Ever since I met you…" he started, running a hand through his hair in frustration. It was as if he had led a separate life since she had arrived. For three years she had been a part of his life -- the chaos in his life.

Seeing his frustration grow, Hoshi froze. He was tired and volatile. "What, Malcolm?" she asked. She should feel bad for leading him, but she wanted him.

"I've wanted you," Malcolm admitted softly, responding to her husky tone.

Hoshi reached for him, but he caught her wrist. "Don't," he said, his voice the barest of whispers. "I need answers, not more complications."

His words frightened her and she tried pulling away from him. "I have no answers for you," she replied, unable to meet his steady gaze.

"You looked hunted when you arrived. I remember that much. It was as though you were running from something."

Hoshi's breath hitched in her throat, his words striking at her core. He was right. She had been running. She had been running ever since that day Malcolm had kidnapped her, vaguely informing her of her role in future events.

"You had that same look in your eyes when you returned from Risa."

"I…was…tired," she lied. "You know how it is…when you're on vacation. The one thing you hope to do is rest…then you never do. There was so much to see…so much to do and –"

"I spent my entire time on Risa tied to Trip, but my memories of Risa are quite different. At first they were dreams, but they've blurred into memories," he rattled on. "I was angry with you…concerned for your safety. We fought…then made love. It happened then," Malcolm said more to himself than to her. "Just before you were transported to T'Pol. You were afraid of me…angry with me. On Risa you were angry with me."

"Stop," Hoshi whispered, her eyes wide with fear. Did the temporal disease affect him as well? He didn't know. He couldn't know.

"We made love on Risa," he repeated shakily, hoping to God she would say something… hopefully confirm he wasn't losing it.

Hoshi's struggle ceased and tears started to trickle down her cheeks as she bit her lip. She wanted to tell him the burden of what was to come.

"We've been out here for three years…always at risk…in danger," Malcolm sighed. "With you it was always different…like I had a vested interest…added worries.

"Stop," Hoshi pleaded again.

He gave her a little shake. "Why should I, Hoshi? Tell me I'm not crazy. Tell me I've dreamt it all."

"I can't," she whispered in reply.

"Something's happened. Something will happen," he continued, putting pieces of his dreams and bits of his daydreams together.

He was angry, the thin line of his lips drawn sharply into a frown. The temptation to tell him everything loomed before her like a dim, inviting light in the blackest of darkness. "I wish I could tell you," she admitted weakly.

The small disclosure moved him to her, crowding her…intimidating her. "When I was recovering from heatstroke, it was like I was in two place at once."

"Temporal displacement disorder," she whispered, clinging to him.

Her words were familiar to him, yet unfamiliar.

"What did you say?"

Swallowing the lump in her throat, Hoshi confessed. "Daniels…"

Malcolm waited.

"I don't know how…how to explain," she whimpered. She took a shuddering breath and closed her eyes. "You…you traveled back in time to…to save me. I was poisoned when I came on board…by the Suliban. It's so confusing. He…you're gone now. You were sick. I don't know much about it, but you called it temporal displacement disorder. Doctor Cole said you would die if you didn't return to the future. I can't tell you any more. It will contaminate the timelines."

"Please don't ask me to say anymore," Hoshi pleaded weakly, her breath against his ear. "I've had three years of being…manipulated by you…fearing the worst…wondering if the world would end because of…something I did, or didn't do."

"Hoshi, I –"

"I need you," her words beseeched him. "I need you to make love to me. I need –"

Her words were lost as his lips touched hers, softly at first, as though seeking permission she gladly bestowed. He heard a groan…his or hers, he didn't know. He didn't care as his tongue sought hers. He needed her. He needed to taste her, feel her melt around him.

Tasting tears in their kiss, Malcolm pulled back and looked into her desire-muddled eyes. "Hoshi –" he gasped, his thought lost as her hands worked their way into his uniform. Willingly he obliged, shrugging his arms out of his sleeves and groaning as her bold touch glided over his body.

Hoshi tore at his clothing, groaning in encouragement as he did the same to hers. "Yes, Malcolm," she said huskily. "I need to feel you inside me."

Her words inflamed him, and he kicked his boots and uniform off, trailing a wet path of kisses along her neck and collar. As he suckled her breasts, his fingers tested her. There was no finesse, desperation clawing at both lovers and hastening them toward consummation.

Malcolm gasped as he felt the dagger-like spikes of her nails pull his boxers down, then groaned as her warm palm encircled him. He collapsed to the floor, pulling her on top of him, skin against skin…want versus need.

He tried to keep his eyes open as she sheathed him, surrounding him with her heat, but he couldn't.

Hoshi teetered on the edge, rocking back and forth and seeking release, oblivion nearing. Managing to keep her eyes open, she committed the moment to memory.


	20. Catalyst nineteen

A/N -- The last three chapters will be up tomorrrow. Thanks to all who have reviewed.

Chapter Nineteen –

The room was cavernous, the decorations going on for what seemed like miles. To Hoshi, it looked as though the entire planet was crammed into the arena to celebrate Enterprise's return and an end to the Xindi conflict. Only a month had passed since they had returned. Most of the crew had taken extended vacations as Enterprise underwent repairs.

Sitting at a long table, she sipped her wine and ran her hand down the length of her sash. Unlike the male members of Starfleet, she was able to opt out of the traditional Starfleet dress uniform and wear her own dress. The sash of navy blue and gold was the only thing that marked her as a member of Starfleet.

"Ensign Sato?"

She tried not to cringe, but it was difficult. Between the politicians and the brass, she was sick of the praise and good wishes. At this point her head was ready to explode. Whether it was from the wine or her condition, she didn't know. According to Phlox, she still had a few more treatments left. "Yes?" she replied, moving to get up.

"Oh, don't trouble yourself," a man in a tuxedo stated loudly and sat down across from her. "I was wondering if I could speak with you for a moment."

Even with her sensitive hearing, she could barely hear him over the loud buzz of the crowd.

"I'm from the University of Tranquility and was wondering –"

"I have to go," Hoshi interrupted abruptly. The man across from her was from one of the most prestigious Lunar universities, obviously hell bent on offering her a teaching position. She knocked her chair back as she stood up and walked away.

Pushing the heavy door open, she walked out into the night, oblivious of the garden path she was on. She just needed to get away. The noise was too much. The future…

She just didn't want to think about it. So many people had died already. She had fulfilled her role in history. That's what Doctor Phlox had told her after Major Hayes and the MACO's had rescued her. She still wasn't sure how the temporal tag had worked, but it had. Their Xindi allies and Enterprise were able to track the weapon through the vortex.

She remembered bits and pieces of her brief time with Commander Dolim and the parasites. The way he gloated…his certainty his species would prevail. Somehow she had managed to overcome the first round of parasites, and had programmed an extra layer of encryption. After they had found out she was resisting the parasites, she remembered little else.

Snippets of Malcolm's voice coaxing her into consciousness had been her next recollection. His voice had been laced with guilt as though he had known along of her role in the Xindi conflict.

Finding herself at the edge of the garden and realizing the noise of the party had dissipated, Hoshi stopped. The breeze of the cool night air danced across her skin and the sound of crickets soothed her. She took the sash off and threw it to the ground. It was highly unlikely she would return to Starfleet.

The UT was perfected and there was nothing to keep her on Enterprise.

"Hoshi?"

So focused on the calming sound of the crickets, she hadn't heard the footsteps that followed hers. She turned, not really needing to. She could tell by the timber of his voice. It was Malcolm. She had been avoiding him ever since they had gotten back. Resisting the urge to jump in the bushes and hide, Hoshi straightened as she got ready to face him and answer the questions she knew he had.

Malcolm could tell she was anything but pleased to see him. Her arms were crossed over her chest and she was frowning. Even frowning, she was beautiful. Her long, black dress was only a shade blacker than her hair. Her sash was on the ground, and he bent over to pick it up. "Are you okay?"

"Yes," she answered, feeling her lips break into a fraudulent smile.

Her inflection gave her emotional state away. They had all suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder in one form or another, but Hoshi's recovery had been tenuous at the best of times since Major Hayes had rescued her.

He would never forget those events…the shaky alliance with the Xindi and their return to Earth. He had lost Corporal Hawkins during their intelligence-gathering foray into the sphere. That was one of the most difficult things he had ever done, telling Major Hayes that Hawkins had died on the mission. He hadn't been prepared for the words that soon followed.

Hoshi had been taken.

After they had made love, they had never had the chance to talk. They were literally swept up in the events. They had said nothing after waking, making love in the shower and parting ways at her door.

Even after she had been recovered and the weapon destroyed, there had been no time to talk. She had played a crucial role in disarming the weapon and her health had suffered as a result of it.

Somehow, Hoshi had managed to keep it together through the difficult journey home. Once they had gotten back to their own time, she had collapsed, having a relapse of some kind that Doctor Phlox had treated with his usual patience and skill. That was when he had found out about the Doctor's involvement in Hoshi's mystery.

Phlox had been reluctant to answer his questions, but he did provide some answers. He had confirmed what Hoshi had told him already. She had been poisoned shortly before originally arriving on Enterprise, and Phlox had found the antidote. But there were still so many unanswered questions – questions Hoshi still hadn't answered.

She seemed so fragile, even now. "You ran out. I wanted to make sure you were okay," Malcolm stated softly.

Hoshi could hear the lingering questions in his statement. "I'm fine, Lieutenant."

"Lieutenant?" Malcolm's voice betrayed his surprise over her cold, professional tone. Resisting the urge to grab and shake her, he took a step forward. "Isn't it a little late for ranks, Hoshi?" he questioned harshly.

Her eyes widened but she didn't step back. She wasn't going to let him bully her anymore or cater to his guilt.

"It's time you stop running."

His words struck a nerve long ignored inside her. She had been running. She'd been running ever since he had pushed his way into her apartment and kidnapped her. He had changed her perceptions and her life.

"It's time for you to tell me what happened."

"Time?" she scoffed softly. "I have no concept of time anymore, Malcolm. I feel disjointed, like I'm not even here. All my life, I've known who I am and what I was doing. I've been a linguist all my life. My ability has always defined me."

He didn't move and barely breathed as he felt the answers he sought within his grasp.

"They needed to kill me. They needed to ensure my…gift, not be used against them," she sniffled. "But you wouldn't let them kill me. You came back in time to save me…to try and prevent me from accepting the position on Enterprise."

Looking up into the sky, Hoshi took a deep cleansing breath, and continued. "You told me I was a catalyst – someone who would change the course of events. It wasn't until after the first Xindi attack that I found out what I was supposed to do." She wiped the tears away, but more fell in their place. "Imagine being told you were responsible for the death of billions. The talent that has defined you all your life will be used against everybody you've ever known and loved. I was abducted by the Reptilians and forced to decipher the Aquatics' code."

"But we found you," Malcolm whispered shakily. "We stopped them. You're safe now. I –"

"That's just it, Malcolm," Hoshi confided. "You didn't stop them. Enterprise wasn't able to track the weapon through the subspace corridor. I was tagged with a temporal beacon."

Her words hung in the clear, night air, echoing deep within him. It explained a crucial moment shortly after she had been taken. Schematics for a tag tracker appeared on his console, but the technology was way beyond Enterprise's capabilities. He had informed the Captain, who turned the plans over to the Xindi council. He had known!

Watching the subtle expressions cross over his face, Hoshi sighed. "T'Pol hypothesized that the Reptilians would have found another way to crack the Aquatics' code and deploy the weapon against Earth if they didn't force me to do it. They tagged me –"

"I used you," Malcolm muttered slowly. The strategy was sound and the tactician in him knew it.

"You were in no position to make that decision."

"I knew all along what would happen to you and I did nothing to stop it."

"You were ill," she sobbed. "You pleaded with me to return to the future with you, but I couldn't. I…I don't even know if you survived."

He shook his head, almost becoming entrapped in the endless guilt that threatened to consume him. As gently as possible, Malcolm grabbed Hoshi and pulled her into his arms. "Hoshi," his voice soothed.

He was solid and warm, and she melted against him.

"You're fine, luv," he whispered against her hair. "You're safe. I'm here." He rubbed her shoulders, trying to keep the chill away from her skin, and realizing then that he would do anything for her. He loved this woman.

His touch was like fire, arousing yet repelling at the same time. His lips found hers, the faintest of touches, searching for forgiveness. Pulling away, Malcolm sighed.

Looking into his eyes, Hoshi saw the questions and uncertainty – and the guilt.

He wiped her tears away. "Hoshi, I –"

"Don't," her whispered voice silenced him.

Guilt was a powerful motivator and she didn't need any more in her life.

"I love you," he declared past her attempts to silence him. Taking her hand in his, he kissed it. "I want to –"

"Don't," she pleaded and pulled her hand free.

Malcolm attempted to capture her hand, but she stepped away. "Hoshi?"

"I don't," her voice rasped, raw with conflict. She continued to back away from him.

"Hoshi?"

Holding her hands up for him to stop, Hoshi wiped the remains of tears away, took a shuddering breath, and looked him in the eyes. "I don't love you."

He stared at her as she walked away, knowing her parting words were a lie.

TBC --


	21. Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty –

Two years later –

There are moments in your life you never forget.

Telling Malcolm she hadn't loved him had been the most difficult thing she ever done. From the moment he had entered her life, her life had shattered. Concepts had been warped and she had started to fear the unknown.

To her, time travel had been fantasy – until he came along. During the lapses of contact with him, her first three years on Enterprise, she had studied everything she could regarding time travel. She told no one, not even Phlox.

Only those directly related to Malcolm's mission retained any knowledge of it.

The Xindi weapon had been destroyed before it could discharge its fatal ray of destruction. The paradoxical wave that Malcolm had been sent back to prevent had turned into a minor ripple, negating the thread he had originated from.

With the different theories of temporal mechanics Hoshi had studied, she had come across one constant theme – do not interfere. It was clear to her that she and Malcolm had never "happened" in the time he had left for the past. It would be unfair to him to change his future and actively pursue a relationship with him.

She had told him too much already. He needed to be able to make his own decisions. She really should have left Enterprise. In fact, she had planned on leaving. But, Captain Archer had persuaded her to stay.

Malcolm had remained on board too, treating her with a professional decorum that had bordered on annoying.

Last year he had received a promotion to lieutenant commander. She had tried to hug him, but he had stepped back and held out his hand.

Two weeks ago, Hoshi had received a promotion to lieutenant. The party had been loud yet hollow for her. Malcolm hadn't been there, and she had mourned his absence. That was the night everything had changed.

The party was nearing its end and she had made her excuses to retire. Hoshi had walked past several skeleton crews on her way to the armory, not really caring if anyone saw her or what she was about to do. She had entered the armory as though it were her domain, walking up to stand before a startled Malcolm.

"Is there something I can help you with, Ensign…er…Lieutenant?" he had asked softly as his eyes ran up and down her body, staring at her with a hunger that rivaled her own.

She had pressed her body against his and had kissed him, pulling away and whispering an invitation to him that she had hoped he wouldn't refuse.

As Hoshi had walked away, she had realized her error. Malcolm wouldn't get off duty for several more hours.

She had felt foolish, hoping he didn't think she was teasing him. Worrying about what she had just done, Hoshi had taken the long way to her quarters. When she had arrived, she had found Malcolm leaning against her cabin door.

No words had been exchanged as they stripped one another of clothing.

That had been the night everything had come crashing down around her.

She had thought he had been having a bad dream, but that wasn't the case. He had writhed in pain, moaning and twisting as if some eternal force had tormented him. Hoshi had clicked the lights on, gasping.

Hoshi had always wondered if Malcolm had made it back to his time. Now she knew.

She leaned over his supine form and brushed an errant lock of hair off Malcolm's forehead.

Phlox was at a loss to explain Malcolm's arrival. Daniels had arrived long enough to confiscate the PADD and give a vague explanation as to what was wrong with Enterprise's armory officer. The temporal agent had theorized that the thread Malcolm had originated from had become unstable. The temporal PADD's failsafe had dumped him into the nearest viable thread. Daniels had no idea how or why the two Malcolms had merged into one, stating it was highly unlikely that Malcolm would ever wake up.

The sickbay lights made him look older than he really was.

"I love you," she whispered against his ear.

--

Two weeks later –

Dreams were nature's way of giving you hope and crushing them at the same time. For years he had dreamt of her, some visions of her mundane, while others were horrific. Either way, there had always been one constant throughout his dreams.

He had never heard her voice.

That was why the sound of her voice now seemed so real, calling to him through the colorful haze of his dreams. Hope manifested itself in the dreamscape as vibrant colors overtook the darkness.

A soft question teased him. Was she alive?

His head hurt and he frowned, a subtle memory trying to surface. It was impossible. She had been dead for a few years now.

"That's it, Malcolm," her hopeful whispers brushed against him. "Come back to me. I need you."

--

Leaning her head against the bed, Hoshi sighed, hating the tears that threatened to fall.

"You have to give the treatment time, Hoshi," Phlox comforted. "From what I read, the lanquin treatment is extremely slow, and I've only been administering it for a week. He's already made more progress than I would have expected at this stage."

Hoshi lifted her head and smiled weakly. "I know," she sniffed. "He's dreaming now. I can see the rapid eye movement."

"It will take time for his synaptic pathways to integrate –"

"How much time?" Hoshi stood abruptly, knocking her chair over.

Having no answer for her, Phlox looked away.

"How much time do we have?" Hoshi asked, waving her hands in frustration. "You can't keep Starfleet off your back much longer."

"The facilities on board were not designed for long-term care, but I'm adamant Malcolm remain on Enterprise. If…when he wakes up, he'll need to be in a familiar environment."

"But –"

"Rest assured, Hoshi. I have Captain Archer's full support. Malcolm isn't going anywhere."

--

A few months later –

Upon opening his eyes, Malcolm immediately recognized the noises around him – the nocturnal noises of Doctor Phlox's menagerie. Disappointment coursed through him as dreams gave way to reality. At least in his dreams, he could hear her voice now. He blinked, trying to adjust to the lights.

Maybe, if he went back to sleep, he could hear her voice again. That's what he missed most about her – the sound of her voice, especially the sound of passion that would escape through her lips as they made love.

He could die in his dreams and hardly mourn his own mortality. She was gone, and he was still here.

As that last thought crossed his mind, he frowned. How had he gotten here?

Searching his memory, Malcolm tensed.

He had arrived on Enterprise per Commodore Archer's request. He had mentioned something to do with Hoshi. With a muffled groan, he tried to sit up.

The animals fluttered, alerting their caretaker that something was wrong.

Wearily, Phlox pulled the curtain open to double check on his patient. Three months of caring for Malcolm had left the physician in desperate need of an extended hibernation period.

Phlox blinked several times and rubbed his eyes in disbelief as he watched Malcolm struggling to sit up. "Careful, Lieutenant Commander!" the doctor cautioned, grasping Malcolm's arm and helping him.

Malcolm's puzzled look deepened. "Commander," he corrected softly, his voice raspy.

Phlox took his time adjusting the bed and pillows before he said more. Of all the possible scenarios he had envisioned, Phlox hadn't thought of this one. "What is the last thing you remember, Mr. Reed?"


	22. Chapter TwentyOne

Chapter Twenty-one –

She waited, holding her breath and listening to the conversation on the other side of the curtain.

"What's the last thing you remember?" Archer asked.

Looking from the commodore to the doctor, Malcolm chose his words carefully. "I was walking down the corridor with you, sir." Subtle differences had caught his eye, and he had begun to worry.

"And?" Jon pressed.

Malcolm gave an exasperated sigh. "What's wrong? What happened? How did I wind up in sickbay?"

Seeing his patient's temper flare, Phlox intervened. "You had temporal displacement disorder, Mr. Reed. You've been in sickbay for three and a half months now –"

"That's ridiculous!" Malcolm interrupted. "I've never been displaced. How can I have a disease when I've never been exposed to the cause? I've never traveled through time, Commodore. Aside from you and T'Pol, I don't even know anybody who has."

"Commodore?"

Malcolm looked at Jon's clothing. "Why are you wearing captain's pips, sir?"

"Malcolm, do you know what date today is?" Phlox questioned.

Scowling, Malcolm crossed his arms over his chest. "Assuming I haven't pulled some sort of Rip Van Winkle act, it's May 10, 2159."

Archer looked from his armory officer to his chief medical officer worriedly. This reeked of Daniels and the temporal cold war. "Malcolm…Today is September 10, 2156."

Archer's words hung in the air as Malcolm tried to comprehend their meaning. "I…I was head of security on Mars. You contacted me…asked me to come here…something about Hoshi. You said Daniels had a plan to thwart the deployment of the Xindi weapon. We wouldn't survive another temporal paradox."

"Malcolm, what are you talking about?" Jon puzzled. "We stopped the Xindi weapon."

Shaking his head, Malcolm tried getting out of the bed. "We couldn't track the Reptilians and Insectiods through the vortex. Earth was destroyed…Hoshi died!"

Phlox placed a steadying hand on Malcolm's shoulder. "Mr. Reed, perhaps you should lay back down."

Malcolm closed his eyes. Nothing made sense anymore. "What is going on?"

"Apparently you did travel through time. You traveled into the past to stop Hoshi from joining Starfleet," Phlox stated, trying to recall what Malcolm had told him upon their first meeting.

Opening his eyes, Malcolm asked, "Is she alive?"

Hoshi moved the curtain aside and stepped past it. "I'm here, Malcolm."

She had his answers. He had moved through her life, had changed her fate. She owed him answers.

"Hoshi." His voice teetered between the brink of fear and hope. Only in his dreams did he remember her features. Her softness…her curves…the sound of her voice. He reached for her, not believing his other senses. If he could touch her, then she would be real.

Intertwining her fingers with his, Hoshi pulled his hand to her lips.

Moments passed as a memory surfaced. It was before she was taken. They had argued. He remembered being jealous…of himself? Errant strands of a conversation long ago played in his mind. Hoshi had mentioned the temporal disease as she had showered kisses over his hand shortly before the Reptilians had taken her.

That had been his reality for the past five years – surviving without her.

"Please…" he whispered, his voice thick with emotion. "Please tell me this isn't a dream."

"I'm real, Malcolm," Hoshi replied, finally understanding what he had been through, why he had done it. "This isn't a dream."

--

Several weeks later –

Shifting in his sleep, Malcolm pulled his wife closer and smiled as she sighed in her sleep. Having learned from his past, he had wasted little time making Hoshi his wife.

Three years were still missing from his life, but he gladly exchanged them for his life with Hoshi. He had gone through a debriefing, unable to tell Starfleet anything specific to time travel. They had listened to the alternate future. Whether they had believed any of it, he had no idea.

Malcolm didn't really care. He had Hoshi now.

The hole in his past worried her more than it did him. A few days into their newfound relationship, she had confided her fear. Even though she was exhausted, she had kept him up, nudging him whenever he had drifted off to sleep. She had been afraid he wasn't going to wake up again. Almost as frightening was the possibility that he would wake up a different Malcolm.

He hadn't considered what it must have been like for her, having her ordered life usurped by him. He still didn't remember any of it. He didn't remember kidnapping her. He didn't remember Risa.

"I can hear you thinking," Hoshi mumbled groggily. "And worrying."

He smiled and nuzzled her neck. "I was wondering if I should bother getting up early and go to the gym. But, seeing as we had such an adventurous workout last night…"

Hoshi peeked at the time and groaned. "It's four in the morning!"

"Early bird catches the worm," he teased and stretched beside her.

Chuckling, Hoshi ran her hand down his chest and mumbled something he couldn't hear.

Malcolm groaned as her hand encircled his sex.

--

Rank had its privilege and being newlyweds did too. Malcolm smiled as he dressed, watching Hoshi sleep. He had turned the alarm off and had informed the captain that she would be late.

The captain hadn't been surprised, simply mumbling something about Ensign Conners extending his shift for a few hours.

Kissing her forehead, Malcolm walked out the door of their cabin and into a large, unfamiliar room.

Before he could adjust, a weak voice called out. "I knew you could do it, Malcolm."

Malcolm turned and saw an elderly Jonathan Archer sitting up in bed. Dread and alarm swarmed through him as his seemingly perfect reality changed before him.

"Don't be alarmed, Malcolm," Jon said calmly. "I wanted to explain…I needed to explain what happened."

"You have to send me back." Malcolm panicked. "Hoshi –"

"You'll be back before she wakes up."

"What do you want?"

"You, T'Pol and I are the only ones who remember the way things could have been…that thread where everything ended."

Malcolm shifted uncomfortably, remembering the billions of lives that had been lost.

"Daniels was wrong to focus solely on me. I couldn't have done everything I did without the crew. Hoshi –"

"Leave her alone," Malcolm warned.

Jon winced as pain ran through him. "The adjustments have been made. The threads have tightened."

Frowning, Malcolm approached Jon. It was then that he saw a figure in the corner.

Daniels stood aside, waiting for Archer's last wish to be fulfilled.

"What's wrong with him?" Malcolm asked the temporal agent.

"Temporal displacement disorder," Daniels stated softly.

Malcolm shook his head in disbelief.

"Your thread of origin dissipated as soon as the Xindi weapon was stopped. When you tried to return, you returned to a temporal safe house four hundred years into the future. I contacted Archer. He decided to send you to the nearest viable alternate thread."

"Why don't I remember the mission?"

"Some memory loss is expected during the overwriting process."

Malcolm frowned. "Is that what you call what happened to me – overwriting?"

"You were in no condition to make the decision," Daniels stated. "Archer made the least intrusive decision possible."

"Malcolm," Jon whispered. "I'm sorry."

Malcolm grabbed Jon's hand. "Sir."

"You've got to stop her, Malcolm."

"Who?" Malcolm asked as a chill ran down his spine. Please, God! Not Hoshi.

"Your daughter."

Malcolm turned to Daniels as Jon started babbling. "Who?"

"Inari," the temporal agent murmured softly. "Follow me."

Reluctantly, Malcolm followed him.

"You have to return now," Daniels said, opening a door. "It's better this way."

Malcolm felt a sense of relief coupled with frustration. He conceded that the man was right and nodded in acknowledgment. Stepping through the door, Malcolm saw the walls around him warp into the familiar bulkheads of the corridor.

He flipped his communicator open and paused. Did the captain need to know he'd had a visit from Daniels? Did Hoshi? His decision made, he flipped the communicator shut, and walked back to his cabin.

Hoshi was sprawled across their bed. There was no need to disturb her peaceful slumber.

TBC --


	23. Epilouge

Epilogue –

Several years later –

Running a hand along the line of her uniform, Inari Stewart paused before she pressed the door chime. It hadn't been easy – getting this posting. She had said goodbye to all her family and friends. Saying goodbye to her mother had been especially difficult.

Inari sighed, thinking of her mother. Mothers know things. It was instinctive, and there was no way that Inari could hide the truth from Hoshi.

--

__

The wind blew across the glen, caressing her mother's graying hair as she weeded the small garden. As though sensing someone watching her, Hoshi turned in greeting. Her smiled quickly fell as she saw her daughter standing there.

"I wish your father were alive," Hoshi stated over the breeze. "He'd be able to talk some sense into you."

"Mother…" Inari's voice trailed off, not wanting to make the last time she saw her mother an unpleasant encounter. This would be the last time she saw her.

Hoshi hissed, "If you expect me to give you my blessings, I can't. Time travel is unnatural and wrong."

Inari closed her eyes, stemming the flow of tears. "It's necessary. In order to protect the timelines, we need to ensure there are no more temporal incursions."

"So, you're going backward or forward in time to muck around in peoples lives."

"To observe, Mother. To protect. To make sure the temporal accords stay intact."

Inari saw the disappointed expression of her mother's face and knew her mother would say no more. So she walked away.

--

She took a calming breath and pressed the button to the ready room of her new commanding officer.

"Enter!" came the terse reply.

The door opened and Inari stepped over the threshold, walked up to the desk, and set a PADD down in front of Commodore Archer. "Sir, Lt. Cmdr. Inari Stewart reporting for duty, sir."

Jon scowled at the woman in front of him. If her introduction was any indication, he was back to square one. She was worse than Malcolm, and it had taken him two years to get through his temporarily absent armory officer's stiff veneer. Picking up the PADD, he motioned for the petite brunette to have a seat and pretended to peruse the PADD.

He knew all about her already. Malcolm had hand-picked her to fill in for him while he went home to visit his wife and new daughter. That's why she was here.

She was over one and a half meters tall, her dark brown hair piled on top of her head. Her high cheekbones and dark eyes where the only hint of her Asian ancestry. She was thirty-six, single, and…

Jon shook his head. This wasn't a dating game. She was his new armory officer.

God he needed to get laid! He was definitely feeling all of his fifty-one years thanks to Trip and the forest fire on his cake a week ago. Jon cleared his throat. "Inari… Commander Reed and Lieutenant Sato named their daughter Inari."

"Yes, sir. It's a common name among people with Japanese ancestry," she answered quickly, holding her breath. Her tenuous journey into the past hinged on one person – her father.

__

He had been waiting for her. It had been unnerving being found out by him, but she should have known she couldn't hide from him. He'd always had a way of manipulating her.

Her cover was blown before she even set foot in Starfleet Headquarters.

Enterprise was in space dock for retrofit and her mother was in her third trimester with her. Hoshi was leaving Enterprise.

Inari's cover never fooled Malcolm.

Once he had seen a selection of his potential replacements for his temporary absence, he had known his daughter had come into the past.

"I had hoped I would teach you better than this, Inari," Malcolm stated severely as he brushed past his daughter and into her apartment. When he had seen her doctored Starfleet ID, he knew it was her. "You're as I imagined you…ever since my last run in with Daniels…and Archer."

She said nothing, waiting for him to continue.

"Why have they sent you back?"

Inari said nothing still, her silence confirming her father's suspicions.

__

Malcolm stared at her, able to see himself in his daughter. "You have to go back. You'll be born soon and the temporal displacement disorder –"

"I'm immune."

"How?"

"Youre exposure… You passed the antibodies onto me."

Her father was not deterred. "It doesn't matter," he insisted. "You have to go back to the future."

"I have a mission, Father."

"It doesn't matter," Malcolm replied.

"Yes, it does!"

He could see the stubborn tilt in her chin, the one that Hoshi accused him of so frequently. It was pointless to argue, but he would continue anyway.

"There are temporal agents unaccounted for… potential for assassinations throughout the timeline," Inari stated.

__

"The catalysts," Malcolm whispered, a long-forgotten fear twisting in his stomach. "Hoshi –"

"Is no longer classified as a catalyst. She's safe," Inari confirmed. "We've received viable intelligence that a rouge agent is going to attempt to kill a prominent Starfleet figure."

"Commodore Archer," he guessed.

Inari nodded. "I need to get on board Enterprise. There's no other way to protect him."

Malcolm stared at his daughter, torn between his dislike of temporal meddling and his responsibility to family and duty. "I'll recommend your posting as my replacement," he conceded grudgingly. "On one condition."

Crossing her arms over her chest, she nodded for him to continue. "Which is?"

"Don't interfere."

"I—"

"Unless you feel the Commodore is in danger," Malcolm finished. "Do the job! Nothing more."

"Commander Reed should return in a few months. Seeing as this is only a temporary posting," Jon stated, "you'll be in his quarters."

"Thank you, sir."

Jon rubbed the bridge of his nose. The woman…his officer still had yet to sit down. "If you need anything, the quartermaster will see to it, and –"

Archer's comm panel chirped and a nervous voice sounded over the system. "B-bridge to Com-commodore Archer."

Sighing, Archer pressed the button to respond. Unlike Malcolm, Hoshi had no plans to return to Enterprise, and her replacement was permanent. "Go ahead."

"You're needed on the bridge, sir."

"I'm on my way." Archer stood and walked around his desk. "Welcome aboard, Lieutenant Commander Stewart. Breakfast is at 0600 in the captain's mess.

Inari stared at his back as he walked away, her eyes lingering on his posterior. She shook her head and sighed. She had a sinking suspicion that this mission was going to be anything but easy.

FIN

A/N -- Anybody want a sequel?


End file.
